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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



1 



INCLUDING 
YOU AND ME 



V 



INCLUDING 
YOU AND ME 



BY 
STRICKLAND GILLILAN 

Author of 
"Including Finnigin" 




CHICAGO 
FORBES & COMPANY 

1916 



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<^A^^.o.S^ 



Copyright. 1916, by 
Forbes and Company 



MAY 13 1916 



^CI.A431069 



DEDICATED TO 

THE SAME LADY MENTIONED IN MY OTHER BOOK 

WITH THE SAME SENTIMENTS 



Now I haven't just tried to he " funny," 
And I haven't just tried to he " smart." 
Nor yet is it only for money — 
'Tis largely a matter of heart! 
Long after the laughter has ended. 
Years after the income is spent. 
May the laughs and the loves I have hlended 
Still deepen some human's content. 



PREFACE 

The more than kindly reception accorded 
my other collection of Terses ("Including 
Finnigin") so encouraged my publishers that 
they dared to produce another volume; this 
time excluding the piece that had given my 
stuff its first vogue, but including a lot of 
mighty intimate discussions of things pertain- 
ing to those two delightful folks — you and me. 

(The foregoing is a longer sentence than the 
one beginning the preface to my previous book, 
but you know the second offense always brings 
a longer sentence. ) 

One time there was a prophet (know your 
Bible?) who was sharply scolded for presum- 
ing to call "common" or "unclean" a lot of 
familiar, every-day things. For myself I have 
always held that the mere fact that a thing 
was primitively human, and well-known by all 
of us, was not just for that necessarily to be 
treated with scorn or neglect. That very com- 
monness (maybe I'd better say universality) 
made the thing, in my stubborn way of think- 



ing, all the finer — made it a sort of mental and 
emotional solder to weld us somewhat cantank- 
erous humans into a warm-hearted, sympa- 
thetic brotherhood — the pass-word or distress- 
sign of a world-wide, race-long "lodge." 

So that is the sort of thing I have handled in 
the verses included in this new volume ; and it 
was with that idea imbedded in my mind and 
heart that I wrote them in the first place. 

I hope you'll like them ; that they may warm 
the "cockles of your heart" and make you feel 
closer to a lot of folks you had thought inferior 
to you. And I also humanly hope I've ap- 
pealed to your vanity enough, by telling you 
things you already knew, to make you clasp the 
little volume more closely and say : 

"My, that fellow's smart! Why, he knows 
the very same things I know !" 

Strickland Gillilan. 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

A Baby's Sorrow 142 

A Confidential Praykr 134 

A Consolation 136 

A Defi to Trouble 154 

A Dismal Failure 53 

A Dixie Lullaby 65 

A Facial Study 97 

After School 21 

A Genuine Man 135 

A Hope Song 58 

A Human Hunger 125 

All of Us 81 

Along the Eiver 34 

A Middle- Age Reflection 83 

"And Shut Thy Door" .123 

"Are You There?" 133 

A Safe Plan 14 

Asleep Among His Toys 169 

A Summer Occupation 155 

A Talk to the Boy 23 

Back-fires 59 

Becoming a Man 103 

Before — and Then 149 

Beware! 137 

Book for All Time, The 117 

Boy Dreams 165 

Brother's Faults 163 



Contents 

PAGE 

Children All 164 

Comradeship 157 

Concentration 160 

Daughter 36 

Easier Task, The 115 

Elder Brother, The 189 

Eternal Beginning, The 112 

Ever New, The 67 

Exception, The 119 

Eyes 57 

Folks Need a Lot of Loving 19 

Forgetting the Boy 71 

" Forgive Me " 127 

Fun of Living, The 89 

General Store, The 109 

" Get to " Versus " Got to " 41 

Get Up and Go On 55 

Going a Piece 190 

Greatest Gift, The 35 

Hardening Process, The 93 

He Knew My Father 49 

Hidden Playmates, The 105 

His Dollar 161 

His Little Girl 39 

Husband's Inquisition, The 128 

Inexpressible Lincoln, The 92 

In Sight of Home 37 

Is It Long? 124 

" It Didn't Hurt " 187 

"Just Fine" 74 

Just Nothin' 99 

Keenest Pleasure, The 167 



Contents 

PAGE 

Life's Anesthetic 140 

Life's Other Dimensions 145 

Life's Smelter 176 

Little Local Train, The 51 

'LowANCE, The 179 

Man or Baby 43 

My Christmas Supreme 69 

Nearer Loves, The 121 

Nightly Transfer, The 168 

" Not Worth Fooling With " 151 

One's Own 75 

Our Capacity 63 

Out for a Walk 47 

Precedent 173 

Put to the Test 91 

Relatively Speaking 28 

EiCE Among the Lowly 177 

'Round Father's Grip 61 

" Sacredness " of Some Motherhood, The . . . 143 

Sayin' Howdy .15 

She Has Her Points 78 

She Likes to Drive .17 

Something Sweet to Remember 90 

Song of the Family Man 116 

Songs of Men, The 77 

Sport 107 

Stair-step Children, The 183 

Strawberry Mountains 181 

Their Chief Regret 25 

Their Heritage 33 

Then and Now 146 

This Day , . 131 



Contents 

PAGE 

This Is Final 20 

Those Nights of Broken Sleep 130 

To A Baby Girl 129 

To A Wife 68 

To the Low-Brow 152 

Triflingest Job, The • . . 101 

Two Women 171 

"Unbelievers," The 87 

Unconscious Missionary, The 45 

Universal Lesson, The 147 

Unpardonable 113 

Vital Accompaniment, The 150 

Watch Pictures 27 

We Can Always Learn 31 

Were I Wealthy 29 

What of Your Fight ? 95 

What Verdict? 159 

When Father Cooks 148 

What We Pray For 141 

When I Am Wrong 64 

When Satan Was Puzzled 79 

When the Kids Are Away 85 

When Work Is Through 13 

" Working Too Hard " 188 

Worst Thing, The 48 

Why We Do So .73 

Wifey's Way 174 

Wise Man, The 185 

You AND Me Both 22 

You Can't Mistake 42 

Young-Olds, The 139 



INCLUDING YOU AND ME 

WHEN" WORK IS THROUGH 

WHAT joy to have some honest, self-support- 
ing work to do — 
And babes to run and meet us in the dusk when 

we are through! 
Great work, that helps our fellowman, that fills 

the big world's need — 
Some work that serves a purpose far above our 

human greed ! 
Just that I want — with honest pay, the same I 

wish for you ; 
And babes to run and meet you in the dusk when 

work is through. 

There may be higher aims, although I cannot un- 
derstand 

Just how they could be higher; whether soft or 
calloused hand 

Perform the task assigned by Fate and kindly 
circumstance. 

'Tis work like this and aims like this that make 
the world advance. 

The pay comes thrice — food for your brood, joy 
in the work you do. 

And babes that run to meet you in the dusk when 
work is through. 

13 



A SAFE PLAK 

YOU can't go wrong in this : When you discern 
In some one's work or life a clever turn 
Or worthy deed, go to him and declare 
Your feelings on the subject, then and there. 
Don't sit around and whisper, " That is good ! " 
Go say it — make your pleasure understood. 
Your word of approbation oft may come 
When with discouragement his heart is numb. 

Be not afraid you'll make the fellow vain. 

If in his skull reside a trace of brain 

He knows enough that others can not know 

About his weaknesses, to dull the glow 

Of vaunting pride within him. So your word 

Of cheer will come as song of springtime bird 

To winter-sick humanity; and he 

Will thank his God for you, on bended knee. 

Go to the worker, praise him as it seems 

To you he has deserved. And then his dreams 

Will grow more tangible. His strengthened hand 

Take on the touch of those who understand 

Themselves and their full power. He will grow 

As ne'er he could have grown had you been slow 

In voicing your approval. Shout the song 

Of praise you think deserved — you can't go 



wrong ! 



14 



SAYIN' HOWDY 

SAYIW " Howdy," all tli' day 
To th' folks along th' way ! 
That's the method he pursued 
Whether glum or glad his mood. 
Know 'em? ^Not by face or name, 
But he knowed 'em just th' same. 
Knowed that they was human things 
Just as hoboes are, an' kings. 

Sayin' " Howdy " when he met 
Josey Smith, as black as jet, 
Sayin' it in that same tone 
When he met big Sam Malone, 
With a dozen farms or so; 
Chucklin' " Sam's as good as Joe 
If he's careful " — just that way, 
Sayin' "Howdy," all th' day. 

" When I git t' heaven," he 'lows, 
"Where they's crowns on all th' brows, 
If they's any that kin rise 
With 'is right hand t' th' skies 
An' declare I ever rode 
'Long apast 'im on th' road 
An' left out that ' Howdy ' thing, 
I'll give up my crown, by jing! " 

Sayin' " Howdy," all th' day 
To th' folks along th' way! 
15 



Him nor us will never know 
How he helped folks down below 
By th' friendliness he showed 
To th' folks beside th' road. 
You can't find no better way 
Than just Howdy in' folks all day ! 



16 



SHE LIKES TO DRIVE 

SHE likes to drive. We go out in the sleigh 
And ere we've gone a noticeable way 
She says : " Those gloves of yours are awful 

thin — 
Just see what thick ones my two hands are in! 
You'd better let me drive awhile until 
You get your hands relieved of such a chill " — 
She likes to drive. 

She likes to drive. And when I (knowing well 
Just what she wants, although she wouldn't tell) 
Give up the reins, she turns the horse's head 
Into some road whence other sleighs have fled ; 
And then one runner drops into a ditch 
That somehow gives her lissome form a pitch — 
She likes to drive. 

She likes to drive. And on that lonely way 
When she, to keep the balance of the sleigh, 
Has bent in my direction — don't I know, 
Or am I bashful still and shameful slow? 
Then — then she gives a well-bred little shriek 
And says : " Don't — that leaves wet spots on 
my cheek " — 

She likes to drive. 

She likes to drive. "No matter if I wear 
The thickest lamb's-wool mittens, she'll declare 

17 



My poor hands must be freezing; and she'll take 
The ribbons from my grasp, whereat I make 
IsTo murmur, but proceed to do my best 
To please the maid my coldness has distressed — 
She likes to drive. 



18 



I 



FOLKS NEED A LOT OF LOVING 

FOLKS need a lot of loving in the morning; 
The day is all before, with cares beset — 
The cares we know, and those that give no warn- 
ing; 
For love is God's own antidote for fret. 

Folks need a heap of loving at the noontime — 
The battle lull, the moment snatched from 
strife — 

Halfway between the waking and the croontime, 
While bickering and worriment are rife. 

Folks hunger so for loving at the nighttime. 
When wearily they take them home to rest — 

At slumber-song and tuming-out-the-light time — 
Of all the times for loving, that's the best I 

Folks want a lot of loving every minute — 
The sympathy of others and their smile ! 

Till life's end, from the moment they begin it, 
Folks need a lot of loving all the while. 



19 



THIS IS FINAL 

T ^ rSEiN' you are a fool, you're as big a fool 

» '' As ever the other fellow 
Appears to your eyes — and you so wise ! — 

When his cerebrum's mellow. 
This is hard to say in a pleasant way, 

But it's genuine information — 
Just tamp that down in your calabash 

And start a conflagration. 

When you are wrong you're just as wrong 

As the biggest fool you know 
When he's not right — you may want to fight, 

But this statement's got to go. 
I hate to be snippy and sassy and lippy 

To one in your dignified station, 
But shove that down in your jimmy-pipe 

And start incineration. 

To a man up a tree you're as foolish as me, 

I'm fallible even as you. 
Every self-centered cuss knows he's wiser than us, 

We'll never admit that it's true. 
We can none of us boast who's least brainy or most. 

No reason for self-gratulation. 
Let's put that down in our clay dudeens 

And start a conflagration. 



20 



AFTER SCHOOL 

WHEN" home from school's long day he 
drifts 
And to my gaze his fresh face lifts, 
I read the tale of all the joys 
And sorrows that are every boy's — 
I knew them once. I feel them yet, 
Through later living's deeper fret. 
But still I hold him close, and say 
" Son, tell me all about your day." 

He tells me — whimpering o'er each grief. 

And laughing next in swift relief : 

The big, bad boy who hid his hat ; 

The girl who slipped from where she sat, 

To meet with Teacher's well-earned frown ; 

And how the littlest boy fell down ! 

I list — not that I do not know. 

But only that I love him so. 

When, at life's troublous school day's close, 
Each world-worn pupil homeward goes. 
Straight to the Father's eyes we'll raise 
Our own, prepared for blame or praise. 
He'll slip an arm around, and say : 
" Child, tell me all about your day." 
ISTot that Our Father does not know, 
But only that He loves us so. 



21 



YOU AND ME BOTH 

I HAVE a lot of grievous faults. 
My pilgrim way is filled with halts 
And limps and stoppings by the road. 
When discipline applies her goad 
I wince. I often note (with grief 
That holds no prospect of relief 
Through future mornings, nights and noons) 
That every one is full of prunes, 
Including me. But I cheer up 
And feel joy brimming in my cup 
When I look closer still and see 
How patient I have been with me ! 

I know of none from whom I would 

So much of foolishness have stood, 

As I have daily borne when I 

Was the offender. Should I try, 

I could not take from others what 

I've stood from me, without a swat 

On the offender's eye or nose. 

You'd find it hard to presuppose 

How many things I can excuse 

Wliene'er tbe miscreant wears my shoes. 

'Twould make old Job seem peeved, to see 

How patient I can be with me ! 



22 



A TALK TO THE BOY 

COME, boy, to your dad. Let me tell you 
some things 
Of the man who loved me as I'm now loving you. 
For the heart is a pendulum, heavy, that swings 

Aye forward and back, as all pendulums do. 
And tonight, mine has swung far away to the time 
When your dad had a dad — just as you have, 
my son ; 
A dad to whose arms I was welcome to climb 
When his day in the cornfield or meadow was 
done. 



I crept into arms that were stronger, my lad; 
And his hands — O, so tender ! — were harder 
than mine. 
For the world had been harsh with the dad of your 
dad. 
Yet I wish that my soul were as gentle and fine 
As the one roughly clad in that body of his 

That so lavishly gave of its strength for the one 
Who now shelters you. And my prayer's burden 
is 
That you may think thus of your father, my son. 

What I've gained, I have gained ; his the heavier 
cost. 
He, in embryo, held all the things I have done. 
23 



Yet I fear — gravely fear there are things I have 
lost 

That sadly diminish the triumph, my son. 
So lie close, little man; there's so little we know 

Except that I love you and you can love me. 
And I smile with content that you're loving me so. 

And am glad in that love, as my dad used to be. 



24 



THEIR CHIEF REGRET 

WE wan't such a gloomy bunch o' guys, an' 
we didn't dwell on fret, 
But for some fool notion or other, why we called 

it Camp Regret. 
Whether 'twas 'cause we was middle-aged an' our 

eye-teeth cut, or whether 
We'd a bitter streak when we named it, we all of 

us, hell for leather. 
Tuck up with th' name, an' it stuck. One night 

when we all set 'round th' fire 
An' each was doin' heavy work to prove him th' 

biggest liar, 
Jim Marshall says : " I wonder what, as we've 

roamed from coast to coast, 
Us old sour doughs has ever done that we regret 

th' most." 

I bet for seven minutes or more they wasn't a guy 

that spoke. 
I can't remember which of th' boys that age-long 

silence broke. 
And th' tales that follered — not one of th' lads 

had loosened so much before. 
I reckon one of you writer chaps would 'a' got a 

hefty store 
O' stuff fer th' tales you write an' sell if you could 

'a' been around, 
But they wouldn't 'a' told th' yams they told had a 

stranger face been found 
25 



About th' fire. An' when they was done, one 

feller spoke again 
An' said : " We've none of us hit th' mark, or 

I'm no judge of men." 

Then all agreed they would write it down, their 

chieftest-of-all regret. 
An' we passed a pencil and paper 'round to each 

of us, as we set. 
An' every feller wrote it out — th' thing he was 

sorriest of. 
Of all the things in all his life of hardship, hate 

and love. 
And when they was wrote, we gathered 'em — was 

none of 'em to be signed ; 

Jim Marshall read 'em aloud to us with 'is eye 

that wasn't blind. 
An' every feller had penned th' same an' these 

here words was it: 
" I wish I'd wrote to mother, more, while she was 

livin' yit." 



26 



WATCH PICTUKES 

T'D show the photograph I wear 
-*■ Inside my watch, did I not care 
What happened next. But if I did 
He'd pull the picture of his kid 
Or wife on me, and start to tell 
A lot of guff I know so well — 
How can a man so thoughtless be 
When I'd discourse of Mine and me? 

I wear a picture in my watch — 
A reg'lar picture; not a botch! 
It is a picture of my frau 
When she was younger far than now. 
I show the thing to other men 
Who, if I do not leave just then, 
Pull something of the kind on me, 
Though why they do so I can't see. 

I've learned to pick and choose my time 
Por pulling off this watch-case crime. 
I wait until my train has blown 
Por whate'er stop I call my own. 
Then show the picture quick; and run 
Before the other's deed is done. 
A deathless mystery it is — 
Why he should wish to show me his I 



27 



EELATIVELY SPEAKmG 

MY name is Spink. Wher'er I go 
Some one inquires if or no 
I am related to the Spink 
Who used to live at Spotted Mink, 
Four miles beyond the Harwood place — 
Some day I'll push somebody's face 
For taking up my time to grin 
And start with, " Are you any kin ? " 

I know the look that creeps into 

The human eye when he gets through 

Having my name repeated to him 

And when the name at last gets through him 

I see the question coming out 

From his garrulous social spout: 

" Spink, Spink — I know Hank Spink, an' 

Min — 
I wonder if you're any kin." 

And then, no matter how I say 
I'm not, I can't head off this jay. 
He'll go on naming Spinks to me 
And scrambling 'round my family tree 
To show me he's a knowing guy. 
Some day I'll bash him in the eye 
And soak him on the fatuous grin 
For asking : " Are you any kin ? " 



28 



WERE I WEALTHY 

WERE I a wealthy citizen 
I'd help the worthy poor 
Who daily cudgel off the wolf 
That lingers 'round the door. 
I'd feed the hungry, heal the sick, 

I'd clothe the naked, too ; 
There'd hardly be an end to all 
The kindly things I'd do. 

Were I a wealthy citizen 

I'd take each orphan chick 
And send him to the finest school — 

I'd do that mighty quick. 
I'd say to worried widows who 

Could see no light ahead 
" Fear not, for I'll protect you all — 

Think not that hope is dead." 

Were I a wealthy citizen 

I'd seek out struggling youths 
Who fought 'gainst Penury to gain 

Fair Learning's hidden truths. 
I'd let them go through college till 

They reached the outfield fence 
And not one dollar should they pay 

'T would be at my expense. 

Were I a wealthy citizen 

(Let's deal with facts a while) 
29 



I'd lie awake at nights and scheme 
How to increase my pile. 

I'd sit around on Easy street 
And plan and plan and plan 

A hundred other brand-new ways 
To skin my fellow man. 



30 



WE CAN ALWAYS LEAKN 

NO man is wholly foolish, just as none is wholly 
wise; 
The world has precious few extremes, you'll find 
if you'll examine. 
The man who's partly deaf, you'll note, has extra 
useful eyes — 
This " wholly helpless " notion is the plainest 
sort of gammon. 
You hear a fellow work his mouth from morn- 
ing's break till night. 
You're sure he's saying nothing, you condenm 
him without ruth. 
But listen patiently to him — his chatter is a 
fright. 
But 'mid the rubbish he emits you'll find some 
grains of truth. 

There's none so big a fool but that he knows some 
things that you 
Or even I could scarce find out in all our life or 
longer. 
There's none so wise but if you probe his depths 
an hour or two. 
You'll see a lot of little points on which he 
might be stronger. 
So you, though you be foolish — yes, and I, 
though I be wise ! — 
Had best leave off in later years the rashness of 
our youth 

31 



And learn to listen even when the pinhead's spin- 
drift flies — 
Amid the chaff his voice gives forth will be some 
grains of truth. 



32 



THEIK HERITAGE 

THE lovings that we used to get, 
The dreams that came before life's fret, 
The pleasures once we held so dear 
Before the yellow leaf and sere 
And other things accounted drear — 
The children have them now. 



The rosy cheeks we used to wear, 
The daily thrills ere came our care, 
The coastings down the snowy hill 
With juvenile, uncanny skill 
And now and then a joyous spill — 
The children get them now. 

The heartaches over little things. 

The hurts from playmates' thoughtless flings, 

The checkings of each grown-up boss. 

Who must scold some one when he's cross, 

The spankings — who could count them loss ? - 

The children get them now. 
Thank goodness! 

The children have them now. 



33 



ALONG THE RIVER 

T^AYS along the river are the days you can't 

^^ forget ! 

There you lose your worries and there you fling 
your fret. 

Days along the river when the sun is shining 
warm, 

When the air's so balmy that you couldn't think 
of storm; 

When the pink spring beauties and the yellow vio- 
lets 

Make a fellow glad as any fellow ever gets; 

Dreamy plash and gurgle as the ripples slumber 

by- 
Days along the river 'neath a young May sky ! 

Days along the river where the stream runs 
slow — 

You must watch the ripples to see which way they 
flow. 

Picking muddy driftwood and drying it for fire — 

Down along the river is the Land of Heart's De- 
sire. 

Miracles are 'round you and you feel that you 
have found 

Nature in her workshop; where the alchemistic 
ground 

Vies with magic weather in the wondrous feats 
you see — 

Down along the river is the place for you and me ! 

34 



THE GKEATEST GIFT 

TT wasn't the money you gave the chap 
-■■ When you found him down and out — 
'Twas the faith you restored when you bettered his 
hap 
That had filled him with bitter doubt. 

It wasn't the food that your money bought, 

Or the clothes he had needed so, 
But the spirit change that your kindness wrought 

When you set hope's lamp aglow. 

It isn't the human of blood and bone 
Served most when you heed love's call — 

'Tis a human heart just like your own; 
It hungers most of all. 



35 



DAUGHTER 

COOK has quit and mother's cleaning off the 
kitchen shelf; 
Shelf is high and mother's short — has to stretch 

herself. 
After she has done with that, the pantry must be 

swept — 
One would think the cook forgot where the broom 

was kept. 
After that she'll take the stuff from the ice-box 

stalls, 
Wash it out and put things back ; roll some butter 

balls, 
Beat some eggs and whip some cream and bake 

the Sunday pies — 
Daughter's at gymnasium, taking exercise ! 

Last week, when the housemaid left, mother 
cleaned the rugs — 

Got the big ones on the line after many tugs ; 

Waxed the hardwood living room, pulled the heavy 
weight 

Of that big lead polisher — lunch made daughter 
late 

Getting to the downtown place where the classes 
meet 

For the calisthenics that will put her on her feet. 

Seems to Ma a husky girl with observant eyes 

Might not have to leave her home for some exer- 
cise. 

36 



IK SIGHT OF HOME 

ALL day I wander blithesomely adown each 
roadway turn; 
I seek new pastures restlessly and ramble on 
and on. 
But as the red sun westers down, I feel the primal 
yearn 
To be in sight of home again before the light is 
gone. 



The distant hilltop lures my feet, I hunger for 
its view ; 
What lies beyond the darkling wood — I needs 
must run and see. 
All day I bravely plunge ahead in search of vistas 
new. 
But when the twilight comes, my home calls 
lovingly to me. 

Twilight and home are comrade things — would 
they might always meet ! 
My heart breaks every evening when I cannot 
see my own. 
The trip, the crowd, the stranger voice through 
all the day are sweet, 
But dusk brings on the sorrow that I needs must 
bear alone. 



37 



When, after life's long journeyings, your sun slips 
gently down 
The copper-burnished western sky and there's a 
hint of gloam, 
May you not see the stranger hill or wood before 
you frown — 
May life's sweet evening shadows find your soul 
in sight of Home! 



38 



HIS LITTLE GIRL 

SHE brought his dinner to him every day 
He worked upon the job. An old tin pail 
Was what she brought it in and took away 
After he'd emptied it from base to bail. 

She always wore an old sunbonnet — blue, 

With white checks on it. You could see her 
stop 

And look each way until she fully knew 
^0 train was coming; then she'd madly pop 

Across the tracks, as if old ISTick pursued. 

And walk up, grinning at Ted Burke — her 
pa — 

Old Ted, who never was what's called a dude. 
And looked as plain as any other " chaw." 

That is, to us he seemed like common clay ; 

But not to her ! That kid would stand and look 
At Ted as if he were the Queen of May, 

And lovely as a picture in a book. 

One day she didn't come to bring his lunch. 

The next Ted asked to be let off awhile. 
He stayed so long we others got a hunch 

That maybe something'd happened to the smile 



39 



Beneath the bonnet. And when he came back 
To work one morning, with his pail in hand, 

And with his hat band bound about with black — 
We didn't have to ask, to understand. 



40 



" GET TO " VERSUS " GOT TO " 

PERHAPS no other words so much alike 
Upon so many opposites may strike. 
Upon their slight grammatic difference 
Depend a lot of things that give offense 
And cause deep disagreement between those 
Who elsewise would agree like bee and rose. 

For instance, farmers think the engineers 

" Get to " ride on the cars, long years on years. 

The engineer, within his smoke-filled cab. 

Roars past the granger and exclaims, "By grab! 

He gets to live out in the fresh, sweet soil 

And not breathe coal dust, soot and reeking oil." 

While of his job the farmer thinks he's " got to " 
Do things the engineer's job tells him not to, 
So he who runs the locomotive knows 
He's " got to " tear along those twin steel rows 
Till death or pensioned leisure bids him quit — 
" Get to " and " got to " aren't alike, a bit. 

Wife thinks that hubby " gets to " roam around 
Away from home where pleasing scenes are found. 
Hubby well knows he's " got to " do the thing 
That can't be done without his taking wing 
From that loved home where wifey " gets to " stay 
Though she thinks " got to " all the livelong day. 



41 



YOU CAN'T MISTAKE 

IF, when you walk into a little room 
Where sit some niggard souls in chosen gloom, 
You note a furtive look and lowered voice 
Proving your presence is not of their choice — 
And if you catch at one strong word of hlame, 
"No matter if your ear have missed the name, 
There'll be no error credited to you 
If you state calmly, " Sirs, that is not true." 

JN'ine cases out of ten they have no proof 

Of what they say; the warp and e'en the woof 

May be false utterly ; and they may be 

Besmirching one far worthier than we — 

Destroying that they can not build anew. 

So take a chance and say, " That is not true." 

Aye when you hear a brother's name defiled 
With accusations damning, proofless, wild. 
Defend, though blindly. God Himself would say 
A good word for the worst of men, today. 
For if the man be guilty of some wrong — 
Let him that's sinless criticise this song ! — 
The more he needs some friend that's truest 

blue — 
Be that one friend, and say, " That is not true." 



42 



MAN OK BABY? 

ALL of our talk is of engines and horses and 
lions and fires ; 
All of our thoughts are a man's thoughts, while 
he's so broad awake ; 
All of our ways are a man's ways, all that tradi- 
tion requires; 
But Nature — the tyrant ! — is certain her 
merciless toll to take. 
For when he is sleepy we're nothing but a poor 
little bit of a thing 
With a father as foolish as fathers have been 
since the world began. 
So I jealously hold him and rock him and Slum- 
berland melodies sing — 
When he's asleep he's a baby, though when he's 
awake he's a man! 

Just at the age when the man-child would fain lay 
his babyhood down — 
Call him " a baby " — you've hurt him past 
power of surgeon to heal. 
Learning the grownuppish swagger, learning the 
swashbuckler's frown, 
Trying to act as a man acts, to feel as the grown 
ones feel; 
Stretching his stride to its utmost, proud to keep 
step with his dad ! 
Scorning to show emotion, seons too ancient to 
weep! 

43 



But Night, no respecter of persons, refuses to 
humor the lad — 
He's a man when awake, but, God bless him, 
he's a baby when he is asleep — 
The thing that makes parents love-mad — 
Just a wee, helpless babe, when asleep. 



44 



THE UNCONSCIOUS MISSIONAKY 



o 



NE time I knowed a feller 't didn't claim to 
be no saint — 
JVTiich some o' them as claims they are knows 

mighty well they ain't — 
An' ev'ry time I left him, as o' course I often 

would, 
He'd give my hand a squeeze an' say, " Good-bye, 

my boy. Be good." 

He said it kind o' jaunty-like, as if he didn't keer. 
But somehow what that feller said kep' ringin' in 

my ear; 
An' ev'ry step I tuck fer half a mile f'm where 

we'd stood 
Them words kep' up 'ith me an' said, " Be good, 

be good, be good." 

An' all th' hull day at my work in meetin' up 'ith 

men. 
When I'd a chance to do some dirt, I'd think a 

minute — then 
Like some fool tune ye can't f ergit, but al'ys wisht 

ye could, 
Them words 'd come a-limpin' 'long, "Be good, 

be good, be good." 

Some blame loud preachin's hit me like th' water 

hits a duck. 
An' if some preachers fished fer me they've had 

tarnation luck; 

45 



But that plain sinner's made me lie lots nearder 

what I should 
By al'ys sayin', keerless like, " Be good, my boy, 

be good." 



46 



OUT rOR A WALK 

MY tiny son walks out with me 
Along the sweet suburban road — 
Has many a cheery scout with me 

While chattering our own love code; 
He finds a reddened leaf perchance, 

A gaudy butterfly's lost wing, 
A stone from which the sun rays glance, 
Or some such childish-cherished thing. 

All these he bears to me and places 

Within my hand (as I have halted 
To reconcile our varied paces), 

And says with look and tone exalted: 
" See, Father, what I found back there ; 

You missed it when you sauntered by ; 
Your big, strong hand takes better care 

Of these — my treasures — than can I." 

We are but children, walking out 

With Father. All the things we find — 
Gems now, but later viewed with doubt — 

We bear to Him, love — strong and kind. 
And say : " These big, safe hands of Thine 

Can take much better care than we 
Of these — our treasures — rare and fine ; 

,We trust, dear God, our all with Thee ! " 



47 



THE WOEST THING 

FAILUEE, when you have done your best, is 
bad. 
I know a thing a thousand times as sad: 
The sting that failure leaves within your breast — 
An ache that knows no surcease, gives no rest — 
When you recall you did not do your best. 



48 



HE KNEW MY FATHER 

THE look of him was wholly commonplace — 
His grizzled beard, worn garments, fur- 
rowed face. 
It wanted all mj life-learned poise to keep 
Suppressed an adverse note that strove to creep 
Into my judgment as I viewed the man, 
So shaped he seemed on utter failure's plan. 
His was the seldom-traveler's furtive look, 
Cowering uneasy in his red-plush nook. 

To me at length for friendliness he turned ; 

For human fellowship this lone man yearned. 

I humored his pathetic eagerness 

To know my name, my calling, my address. 

" Your father's name ? " He trembled as he 

spoke ; 
And when I told him, o'er his features broke 
A look of satisfaction deep and sweet 
As if I'd made his cup of joy replete. 

"I knowed your pap — why, him an' me was 

chums ! " 
And then I knew the happiness that comes 
To every father-hungry grown-up lad 
Who never ceases longing for the dad 
So little understood in callow days — 
So quick to blame he seemed, so slow to praise ; 
So wished-for now, when wisdom holds her throne. 
That for our disrespect we might atone! 
49 



About that head, erstwhile so commonplace, 
A halo formed, of glory and of grace. 
He'd known and loved the father I had known; 
As boy friends intimate the two had grown; 
I clung to him — I all but held his hand, 
This magic guest from an enchanted land. 
!N^ow with a thrill his voice in memory comes: 
" I knowed your pap — why, him an' me was 
chums ! " 



60 



THE LITTLE LOCAL TRAIN 

T THRILL and gape at limiteds, close-vestibuled 
■■■ clean through ; 

I marvel at their majesty, as other people do. 
I goggle at the high-backed hog with smoke-stack 

like a wart; 
That makes bystanders jump and dodge to hear 

her starting snort; 
She's splendor from her tail-lights to the bo that's 

riding blind; 
But, oh, the local train that serves the lowly of 

mankind ! 

A bunty thing she is, of course, with just two 

coaches on — 
And one of them half baggage. But the poor 

folks know the " con," 
And chat with him and " braky," calling them by 

Christian name — 
The limited's a hummer, but she's loser in the 

game! 
Ear better than her brass-railed perch for wealthy 

folks, behind, 
I love the local train that serves the poorer of 

mankind ! 

Past everything but county-seats — e'en missing 

some of them — 
The limited goes whirling by upon the big " main 

stem; " 

51 



She busts the village ordinance that says, " Ten 

miles an hour ; " 
Just hoots derisive at such burgs and puts on extra 

power. 
The town the local hurries through would sure be 

hard to find — 
The little local run that serves the humbler of 

mankind. 

The trippers on the limited have tickets that have 

cost 
A score or more of dollars — why, a state or so 

they've crossed! 
The local carries shabby folks with fifteen cents to 

spend, 
But theirs is just as big a trip — has starting, 

middle, end ! 
The limited's the classy string ; but greater, in my 

mind. 
The two-coach local train that serves the plainer 

of mankind. 



52 



A DISMAL FAILUKE 

I TRIED to be unhappy, for a girl had jilted 
me; 

I tried to be unhappy — being less would cruel be ; 

But a southern wind was blowing and my break- 
fast had been good — 

A southern wind was blowing and the birds sang 
in the wood. 

The sun was shining brightly and the day was 
sweet and mild — 

I tried to be unhappy, but was gladsome as a child ! 

I tried to be unhappy, for my fortune had been 

lost ; 
I'd had to sell my earthly goods for less than they 

had cost. 
I tried to be unhappy, for the kind world pitied 

me 
And wondered if another pleasant moment I 

should see. 
I tried to be unhappy, but as I approached my 

house 
My laughing baby met me and we held a wild 

carouse ! 

I tried to be unhappy when upon my temple 

gleamed 
The first white hair of middle age — how less than 

I had dreamed 

53 



Were life's rewards! And then I thought how 

richly I was blest 
To have the wife and bairns about as I approached 

the west. 
I laughed aloud, unblushingly, and caroled forth 

my glee — 
I've tried to be unhappy, but have failed most 

dismally ! 



54 



GET UP AKD GO ON 

YOUR wee foot slipped on the floor, my son; 
Get up and go on! 
Your game of tag is far from done — 

Get up and go on. 
That dimpled knee got an awful hurt — 
See the roughed-up skin and the ground-in dirt! 
But you're good for a stronger, swifter spurt — 
Get up and go on. 

Sometimes there are terrible bruises, lad. 

But get up and go on. 
And your father's arms — if it's quite too bad 

To get up and go on — 
Will gather you close and gently say : 
" There, there ! Has it spoiled the baby's play ? " 
But you'll find in the end that the better way 

Is " get up and go on." 

All through your life it will be the same. 

Get up and go on. 
Grin over your pain and play the game — 

Get up and go on. 
For folk will watch when your falls take place — 
Will watch the expression on your face 
And accurately will adjudge your case. 

So get up and go on. 

And whenever the fall too cruel seems 
To get up and go on, 
55 



When hope has hidden its faintest gleams, 

Get up and go on! 
And the arms of the Father-who-knows-what's-best 
Will hold you close to a loving breast 
Till your baffled soul finds strength in rest — 

Get up and go on ! 



56 



EYES 

/^ IVE me back the boy eyes, 
^^ The seeing-naught-but-joy eyes, 
The pleasure-cannot-cloy eyes, 

With which I used to see. 
Take away these old eyes. 
Give back the boyhood-bold eyes, 
The all-that-gleams-is-gold eyes, 

That brought such bliss to me. 

Oh, to have the clear eyes. 

The naught-in-sight-that's-drear eyes, 

The never-shed-a-tear eyes. 

That served me as a boy ! 
Give me back the bright eyes, 
The every-soul-is-white eyes, 
The things-must-come-out-right eyes. 

That brought me only joy. 

"No — most I love the dim eyes. 
The let-him-have-his-whim eyes. 
The oft-with-tears-aswim eyes. 

Of age's gentler heart. 
I'd rather have the kind eyes, 
The helped-out-with-the-mind eyes. 
Than any boyhood's blind eyes 

That only saw in part 1 



57 



A HOPE SONG 

npHE clouds were red when the dawn came up — 
-■■ Were red with a glint of copper sheen. 
The chalice of morn was a glittering cup 

And the world was gay in the dewy green. 
But the sun rose high and the clouds grew gray 

With only a softened silver glow. 
And the world looked old and far from gay, 

But burdened instead with a weight of woe. 

Yet at night when the sun goes down again 

In the ruddy west, we shall see once more 
The gold and the glitter past tongue or pen, 

Shall see the red of the dawn — and more ! 
Our lives and our days are alike in this: 

Both have their glorious morns, then come 
The gray and the grime that we may not miss. 

Till hope shines forth in the evening's gloam. 



58 



BACK-FIRES 

OKCE when I roamed the prairies wild 
With Uncle Bill, he told me : " Child, 
See where that line of blazes runs 
Along that ridge ? As sure as guns 
That fire will get us if we shouldn't 
Fix things just so she fairly couldn't." 
Then at his feet he dropped a match 
And burned a great big safety patch 
In which we stood until the fire 
All round about had spent its ire. 

I've seen that back-fire notion used 
A lot since then — sometimes abused. 
When one o'er-nosey shows that he 
Is wild with curiosity 
To know a thing that surely is 
Not e'en related to his biz, 
We start a back-fire in his mind 
By telling him, just for a blind, 
The very thing he wants to know — 
It disappoints the fellow so! 

And when the gossips are purveying 
Some dirty scandal that's conveying 
To people's minds a false impression, 
You may create a sweet digression 
By starting, publicly as they, 
A story of that self -same jay 
59 



That emphasizes something fine 
In him. As that goes down the line 
It takes the sting from out the other — 
And your back-fire has saved a brother. 



60 



'ROUND FATHER'S GRIP 

WHEN Father's come from some long trip 
We chicks all kneel around his grip 
And try to keep our faces straight 
And not look tickled while we wait 
Till he has hugged our mother tight 
And kissed her twice with all his might. 
We're glad to see him, too, but then 
First thing when he's got home again 
From some great long and busy trip 
We want to see what's in his grip ! 

Then Father kneels among us there 

And digs a key-ring from somewhere 

And looks as if he had forgot 

To bring us things — we know he's not ! 

We gather close while he unlocks 

The grip. Then each one gets a box 

Or parcel tied up with a string 

Or some such gifty-looking thing 

That's 'zactly right. We squeal : " Oh, Dad ! 

The nicest things we've ever had ! " 

It's not just what we get, you see. 
That makes us glad. For it might be 
If Father came home once without 
The gifts for us we'd give a shout 
And hug him hard. But oh, it's great 
That when he's in some other State 
61 



'Way off from home lie thinks of us, 
From ten-year Blanche to one-year Gus, 
So when he's come home from his trip 
We kneel and giggle 'round his grip ! 



62 



OUR CAPACITY 

TEN times I've said : " My soul can bear no 
more." 
Ten times, " Life holds no more of joy," I've said. 
My mind was sick, my mind was wounded sore, 
And hope's last vestige from my sky had fled. 
But looking back to those most hopeless hours 
When I was sure no light could come again, 
I look across a field of sun and showers — 
I've known both keener pain and joy since then. 

We know not what the heart can bear until 
The burdens come. The lighter loads we've borne 
Have strengthened us for fardel and for hill — 
We shall wear sorrows greater than we've worn. 
Yet after every deeper dark comes light 
Such as we ne'er had dreamed on earth could be. 
Then play the human game with all your might — 
Life's hoarding many a prize for you and me! 



63 



WHEN I AM WEONG 
^^ THEN I am wrong, Lord, courage me to own 

To say, " Forgive me for the wrong I did." 
Drive out the wild desire to condone it 

And keep the grievous fault within me hid. 
Yet while I honestly admit my sin, 
Keep off the friend who likes to rub it in ! 

When I have erred. Lord, teach me to admit it ; 

To clear all others of suspicion's taint ; 
To own — and hear the punishment to fit it — 

The wrong in me, nor feel the least restraint. 
Yet while I'd bear the pains my sinnings win. 
Keep from my clutches him who'd rub it in ! 

Lord, all my rank transgressions I would own; 

All my profuse shortcomings I'd admit ; 
I'd shout them out in any sort of tone 

To keep some innocent from being " it." 
But — here my rebel promptings would begin — 
I cannot love the folks who'd rub it in ! 



64 



A DIXIE LULLABY 

LAUGHIN' wif yo' dinneh in de cohneh ob yo' 
mouf — 

Sweetes' pickaninny in dis po'tion ob de Souf. 

Lookin' at yo' mammy fmn de tail-eend ob yo' 
eye — 

Make has'e dar, brack baby, fo' yo' meal-time slip- 
pin' by. 

Make dem sof lips wiggle — yo's a triflin' li'l 
coon! 

Mammy up en take yo' dinneh fum yo', putty 
soon! 

Laughin' wif yo' dinneh in de cohneh ob yo' 

mouf — 
Yo' ain't fear'd de crops will fail en ain't askeered 

o' drouf. 
Kollin' roun' dem shiny eyes at mammy — li'l 

scamp ! 
Mammy she ain't lub yo' none — she fling yo' ter 

a tramp! 
Huh-uh ! Nee'n't pucker up yo' baby lips en cry I 
Mammy gwine ter lub yo' twell de salty sea run 

dry. 

Sleepin' wif his dinneh in de cohneh ob his 

mouf — 
Wahm lips on de proudest mammy boozum in de 

Souf. 

65 



Belly full o' dinneh en his skeer all druv away — 
Lawd! Huccome dey cain't stay small fohebeh 

en a day? 
Bofe dem shiny windehs got dey shettahs farstened 

down — 
Fix dat baid, Sis' Lindy, w'ile he slumbehin' so 

soun' ! 



THE EVER NEW 

T TE knew that he knew all of fatherhood: 
-*• -■■ He had read hooks about it ; had observed. 
He knew quite all there was in it of good; 

How to unselfish sacrifice it nerved 
Men of the feeblest courage. He was wise 
On that and all themes else below the skies ! 

One day his young wife hid her blushing face 
Against his breast and whispered something 
sweet. 

A thrill, of which he ne'er had known a trace 
In all his past, stirred him from head to feet. 

To man's full stature in a trice he grew ; 

At last life's deepest springs he knew — he knew ! 

N'ow when, upon his awkward, untaught arm. 
He holds the helpless mite — Hers and his own, 

And feels that from earth's most resistless harm 
He could defend it with that arm alone, 

He understands as ne'er he understood — 

As though he had invented fatherhood ! 



67 



TO A WIFE 

WE have had our little sorrows 
We have known our little pain; 
We have had our dark tomorrows, 
Had our sunshine after rain. 

But the worst of all our losses, 

Loyal comrade of my heart, 
We have found the little crosses 

That we tried to bear apart I 

Care we jointly bore proved blessing ; 

Care each bore alone proved blight — 
Till, with humbly frank confessing. 

Each returned to each for light ; 

Till we learned the law unfailing 

That controls our happiness : 
Prayer and tears are unavailing. 

Prayed or shed in selfishness. 

Then, though bleak or blithe the weather, 
Be the landscape gray or green. 

Let us cling so close together 
'Not a care can creep between. 



68 



MY CHKISTMAS SUPREME 

'rriWAS an old, blue yam stocking, white-toed 

-■■ and white-heeled, 
That our mother had knit — (we had seen her 
When we stayed 'round the fire with an ear that 

had " healed "— 
Sat with pained but submissive demeanor 
Because of the husking we thus might escape 
In the blustering weather outside). 
'Twas this very same stocking we hung by its nape 
That eve ere the yule's joyful tide. 

'Twas a mean little room — should we see it to- 
day— 

With chromos ill-framed 'round the wall. 

When you came from the porch, you were in — 
right away ! 

No vestibule, storm door or hall. 

For we lived as our forefathers, rugged and 
poor — 

Have a care ! Do not murmur, " oppressed ! " 

We were gentle at heart in the guise of the boor. 

And pride ruled supreme in each breast. 



'Twas a pair of suspenders, some candy, a book 
And a splendid big orange I felt 
When — heart in my throat, too excited to look - 
Next mom on the hearthstone I knelt. 

69 



" That all ? " you inquire. Oh, you wealth- 
pampered thing! 
Suppress the contempt in your tone. 
With those princeliest gifts I was rich as the king 
Who lolls on his vassal-girt throne. 

On Christmases since, all the pitiful cost 

Of the presents that morning I found 

From the price of my gifts could be carelessly lost 

And roll off, unmissed, on the ground. 

But something of wealth has been taken away 

And I wish — or at least so I feel — 

I could trade it all back for the joy hid away 

In that sock with the white toe and heel. 



70 



FOEGETTIISrG THE BOY 

T DARE not ever think of him; 
•■• For when I do my eyes grow dim 
And all the heart of me goes out 
In one long, agonizing shout 
To reach him there, across the miles 
That bar me from his frowns and smiles. 
So, since he can not hear mj call, 
I will not think of him at all ! 

I dare not think of him, because 
It makes my very breathing pause 
Until the lump that's in my throat 
Goes, and a vastly cheerier note 
My daily song may dominate. 
And thus, from early until late 
My will between us lifts a wall — 
I do not think of him at all ! 

An unkind custom has decreed 
That man — however dire his need, 
Though half a woman, by his birth — 
Must never dew the thirsting earth 
With tears of his. O, brute decree ! 
So must I steel the heart of me 
And never let a salt drop fall — 
I dare not think of him at all ! 

I dare not think about the last 
Big hug he gave me — dare not cast 
71 



My mind's eye back to him, or hear 
His vibrant voice close by my ear : 
" See, Daddy, I still got my dollar — 
There, now, I all smeared up your collar ! " 
"None of these things dare I recall — 
I never think of him at all ! 



73 



WHY WE DO SO 

WE talk to them when they're asleep — 
These tiny objects of our love ! 
We murmur to them while we weep 
And call them each our treasure trove. 

We talk to them when they're asleep — 
Oh, wayward children that they are ! — 
And hope that always we may keep 
Their feet from straying into far 

And thorn-girt paths beset with sin^-^ 
That they may never, never reap 
Such harvesting as ours has been — 
We talk to them when they're asleep. 

!N"ow do not bust right out and weep. 
Or let your cheeks with teardrops glisten; 
We talk to them when they're asleep 
'Cause that's the only time they'll listen. 



73 



"JUST FINE" 

IF you ask her how she feels — 
"Just fine!" 
Ask about her new cook's meals — 

"Just fine!" 
Ask her how she liked the show 
Into which you saw her go ; 
Ask her how her house plants grow ■ 
"Just fine!" 

Ask her anything you wish — 

"Just fine!" 
How she likes her chafing dish — 

"Just fine!" 
Ask her how the country'll do 
With its lessened revenue. 
She will simply glow at you — 

"Just fine!" 

" Rather tiresome ? " did you say — 

"Just fine!" 
Hate to hear it day on day — 

"Just fine!" 
But that bromide with a smile 
Has folks beat about a mile 
.Who, in answering, all the while 

Just whine ! 



U 



ONE'S OWN 

FUNNY, ain't it? When th' children of a 
neighborhood is fed 
On the very same variety of grub, 
That some of them is yeller gold an' some of 'em 
is lead — 
Th' difference 'twixt th' thoroughbred an' 
scrub ? 
Thought o' that th' other evenin' when 'twas 
gradjyatin' time 
At th' high-school down to Abernathy's Cove — 
When I see my girl amongst 'em — gosh, th' con- 
trast wuz a crime ! — 
Like a volunteer petooney growin' in a jimson 
grove. 

All th' dresses was as white as hers — I reckon, 
purty nigh — 
All th' ribbons wore wuz either pink 'er blue ; 
All th' posies that they carried growed beneath our 
country sky, 
An' they might of looked about as good to you. 
But th' laws-a-mercy on us! When her ma an' 
me set there 
A wipin' tears an' sniflfin' an' a-lookin' at that 
batch, 
Th' others vrazn't no place — our Melissey, on th' 
square, 
Seemed a volunteer petooney bloomin' in a rag- 
weed patch ! 

75 



Then sez I, it can't be, really ; so I turned an' ast 
M'ri! 
(She's my woman, an' th' mother of th' girl) 
If th' wnz so much of difference, exceptin' in my 
eye. 
An' y' orto seen th' woman give a whirl 
An' snicker at me, scornful, as she says : " I 
reckon SO ! 
Them there eugenic fellers says that they's dif- 
ference in breeds. 
An' any one with half a eye can't scarcely help but 
know 
A volunteer petooney 'mongst a garden full o' 
weeds ! " 



V6 



THE SONGS OF MEN 

A WAIL and a song are the sounds of men; 
Thej tell of joy, of sorrow. 
The wail may rule for a day, but then 

The song must rule the morrow. 
And this you will find, 'mid the lilt or croak 

From the throngs that toil or shirk : 
The wailings come from the idle folk, 
And the songs from those who work. 

For the busiest aye are the happiest — 

'Tis the sloths have time to grumble. 
The toiler goes to his work with zest — 

It keeps him sweet and humble. 
But the idle one aye is the malcontent 

And his whole horizon's murk — 
The song comes up from the life toil-blent, 

And the wail from those who shirk. 

" In the sweat of thy brow " — He knew us well 

Who made us in His image. 
" He knoweth our frame," so the Scriptures tell. 

And the normal life's a scrimmage. 
So list to the song of the toilers brave 

Whose souls keep sweet through work ; 
And close your ears to the mournful stave 

Of the wailers who only shirk. 



77 



SHE HAS HER POINTS 

BEHOLD the old, pot-bellied mare 
Who stands beside the stack. 
She is not stream-lined anywhere; 

She has a sagging back. 
The hair is worn from off her sides 

Where tug and trace have been; 
Profound disgust with life abides 
About that pendant chin. 

Her draggled fetlocks reek with mud, 

Her tail is full of burs; 
No pride of race or purple blood 

Or Blue-grass sires is hers. 
Her sturdy pasterns, chaff-bestrewn. 

Have blemishes galore; 
Through straw-filled mane the breezes croon, 

Each shoulder bears a sore. 

But she has never cast a tire ; 

Her starter always works; 
Her spark-plugs never fail to fire; 

Her timer never shirks; 
Her oil-gauge plunger never sticks ; 

And ne'er has she, I ween, 
Pive miles from home, or maybe six, 

Eun out of gasolene! 



78 



WHEN" SATAN WAS PUZZLED 

OLD Satan looked the victim o'er and sat him 
down and wept. 
He knew his limitations just as anybody does. 
He looked along the shelves where all his torture 
books were kept; 
He called his imps to conference, and held a 
lengthy buzz 
With all his chief advisers, but they couldn't help 
a bit. 
They couldn't find a recipe, a codicil or clause 
Providing for a fate so bad it should be used to fit 
The case of him who'd told his child there was 
no Santa Claus. 

Said Satan, in between his sobs, "Fve had some 
toughs before — 
I've had the man who whipped his wife, the man 
who robbed a church, 
I've had the one who sold the mine filled up with 
salted ore. 
But here's a guy who leaves the others sadly in 
the lurch. 
I've not a room that's hot enough, no pincers that 
will serve 
To gouge this geezer hard enough, though held 
by strongest paws — '■ 
This king of worldly misanthropes who had the 
boundless nerve 

79 



To tell his little children: ^"No, there is no 
Santa Claus.' " 

So Satan wept and wept again and wrung his cal- 
loused hands, 
He had a downright tantrum in his ecstasy of 
grief. 
He said, " I've fixed the worst of them from all the 
climes and lands. 
But what to do with this gazabe, of meanest men 
the chief ? " 
At length he smiled and showed the man (by his 
Satanic magic) 
The thought his sons should have of him — he 
gave a frenzied scream ! 
Then Satan smiled in keener glee — he'd found a 
finish tragic 
For him who'd ruined ruthlessly his children's 
sweetest dream. 



80 



ALL OF US 

KIDS in a cornfield, waving at the train 
That scurries by on its mysterious way 
To lands as distant as the Spanish Main 

Seemed to us in our own untraveled day. 
Barefooted, overalled, sunbonneted, 

Hoe in the hollow of an arm, they wave 
At this fleet vision — coming now, now fled — 
A ride on that? No finer boon they crave. 

Kids in a cornfield, waving at the train. 

While we inside are envious as they — 
We envying them the care-free heart and brain 

That need but dream and wonder all the day; 
We wishing that the trips we needs must make 

Were gorgeous as our cornfield vision seemed 
Before we gambled for life's larger stake — 

While yet behind the scenes we grandly 
dreamed. 

Life is a train at which we children wave — 

We friendly ones: some merely sulk and 
frown — 
Load and unload at cradle and at grave; 

Speeding for one, then gently slowing down 
To drop some passenger whose journey's done. 

We hope to be caught up and carried hence 
To wider vistas, past the setting sun — 

No traveler's tale has e'er been wafted thence! 
81 



And we who wave in friendliness may hope 

To be caught up and carried far and far 
To bigger things, while they who stand and mope 

In bitterness, beside the fleeting car, 
Fast-anchored by their sullenness, remain 

Within the cornfield all their livelong day. 
Then let us wondering children greet life's train 

And for life's finer, broader vision pray. 



82 



A MIDDLE-AGE REFLECTION 

I SAW a chap the other day that once I'd used 
to know. 
His cheeks were rosy, hair jet black, in days of 

long ago. 
But now the roses are not there, the raven hair is 

streaked 
With snowy white where ruthless Time his grim 

revenge has wreaked. 
I marveled. For the heart of me is young as when 

I knew 
The fellow years and years ago 'neath skies of 

youth's own blue. 
And then I chanced to recollect, and heard my own 

voice say : 
" What has been happening to me, while he was 

turning gray ? " 

Day after day I'd seen myself reflected in the 

glass — 
The change had been so gradual my eyes had let it 

pass 
Unnoticed. Had I failed to see myself for such a 

span 
As had elapsed since I had met this other aging 

man, 
No doubt the contrast would have been as great. I 

had been used 
To thinking of myself as still with wine of youth 

infused. 

83 



Perhaps the same was in his mind when we two 

met that day : 
" What has been happening to me while he was 

turning gray ? " 

But young at heart — God keep us that ! Let care 

be laughed to scorn. 
Let's keep our backs to eventide and always face 

the morn. 
Let's keep the ripeness of our noon to guide the 

girls and boys 
Whose youth is callower than ours and lacking 

deeper joys. 
The snow of age may dust our hair, it can not reach 

within. 
We'll teach those careworn youths of ours to bear 

their griefs and grin — 
Go to the one whose empty life has palled on him, 

and say: 
" A wiser youth has come to me while you were 

turning gray ! " 



84 



WHEN THE KIDS AEE AWAY 

EVERY Sunday of my lifetime, when the 
children are at home, 
I must get the " funny papers " — just as many as 

I can — 
And proceed to read them thoroughly — go 

through them with a comb 
And extract their every giggle, from Beersheba 

plumb to Dan. 
And they tickle me — yes, honest ! — quite as well 

as any one. 
I just hurt my sides a-laughing at each bit of 

equine play. 
But I read them over sadly — cannot find a stitch 

of fun 
In the whole disgusting medley, when the children 

are away. 

Do I care ? Am I repentant that I've had so little 

sense 
As to gurgle o'er the follies of the " funny paper " 

folks? 
Am I making resolutions that no more these f roth- 

ings dense 
Shall arouse my cachinnations — that I'll stick to 

subtler jokes? 
"No. Instead I'm always wishing that the kids 

were back again 
So there'd be more fun in living ; so I'd cackle like 

a jay 

85 



Over all the loutish capers of the " funny paper » 



men 



That somehow lose all their tickle when the chil- 



dren are away. 



86 



I 



THE "UKBELIEVERS" 

'VE been around with lots o' ginks 
Of that ludicrous class that thinks it thinks ; 
And I've heard 'em boast of " unbelief," 
Expectin' to see me bust with grief. 
But I only grin, for I full well know 
They mean no more than the winds that blow. 
Let somethin' occur to disturb their mind, 
And you'll see they've faith of the old-time kind. 

One time I was brakin' (the job ahead) 
On th' engine run by Penuckle Red 
With Hardnut Bates on th' left-hand side 
When he wasn't shovelin' — nasty ride! 
For them two geezers set an' cussed — 
Till sudden a wore-out side-rod bust. 
An' both them fellers believed in God 
Till they knowed they was missed by that slashin' 
rod. 

An' there was Johnny Trevelyan — him 

That used t' flag with Crazy Jim; 

Jest th' out-an'-outerest cuss t' swear 

That they weren't no God, not anywhere. 

An' he'd prove it, too, by a process slick. 

An' he kep' this up till his kid got sick. 

Then Johnny prayed — an' his prayin' was 

swell ! — 
Till th' baby started a-gettin' well. 
87 



I've seen 'em often that thought thej thought 
An' laid to " natur' " what God had wrought. 
An' I've seen 'em eat it when danger come 
An' their chance for life seemed on th' bum. 
Belief in somethin' higher up 
Comes nat'ral 's barkin' does to a pup. 
Th' " unbelief " of th' kind I've heerd 
Jest lasts till th' guy gits good an' skeered. 



88 



THE EUN OF LIVING 

< tj TAVEN'T we had fun today? " 

A X Thus my youngster, tired of play, 
Gurgles to me every night 
Just before his eyes go tight 
Shut in restful, dreamless sleep — 
Baby slumber sound and deep. 

" Haven't we had fun today ? " 
One of us is sure to say 
At his bedtime. For his dad 
Is no older than the lad — 
Counting by the way he feels 
When the two kick up their heels. 

" Haven't we had fun today ? " 
As the years grow later, may 
Neither of us e'er deny 
Such assertion, with a sigh. 
May the bigger things of life 
Seem a game, with cheerful strife. 

" Haven't we had fun today ? " 
When God bids me go away 
From this world we so enjoy, 
May I hear him — still " my boy " — •■ 
Laugh his au revoir, and say 
" Haven't we had fun today ? " 



89 



SOMETHING SWEET TO KEMEMBER 

NO matter if things of the present are less than 
we wish them to be ; 
"No matter if joys we'd expected pass by on the 
other side; 
N^o matter if hope's finest fruitage still clings to the 
wishing tree, 
"No matter if some of our dreamings have lin- 
gered awhile and died. 
Even lacking these satisfactions, life is far from 
a pleasureless thing — 
If we've something that's sweet to remember, we 
can bravely and blithesomely sing. 

There was once — howe'er joyless your present — 
when you thrilled with the love of life ; 
You have lived through some perfect moments 
when your darlingest wish was fulfilled ; 
There have been little seasons of triumph, when 
your banner rode over the strife. 
When, just as if Fate were your servant, things 
came as you'd stubbornly willed. 
So now, though your colors be trailing, though some 
other's joy-flag is afling. 
If you've something that's sweet to remember, 
you may live in that mem'ry, and sing ! 



90 



PUT TO THE TEST 

THE friends you've lost by frankness were a 
craven sort at best ; 
They never were the kind you'd want when trouble 

was your lot. 
They were but latent enemies in garb of friendship 

dressed — 
The sooner you were shed of them the better, like 

as not. 
So though it hold the bitterness of wormwood 

mixed with gall, 
The friends you lose through frankness aren't your 

real friends, at all ! 

The friend who knows you as you are, to whom you 
never need 

To give an explanation for your most eccentric act. 

He is the only kind to have — a friend in very 
deed! 

The qualities this good friend has, the " friend " 
you're mourning lacked. 

So doff the sable weeds you wear and whistle some- 
thing gay — 

The friend you've lost through frankness would 
have failed you anyway. 



91 



THE INEXPEESSIBLE LINCOLN 

GAUNT ; solemn ; lines of sorrow in his face ; 
Deep, melancholy eyes where dwelt the grief 
Of all mankind — already you can trace 
The old, familiar formula, in brief. 
We follow when we singers would depict 
The greatest, strangest, sweetest soul since He 
Of Nazareth fulfilled divine edict 
And walked the earth for wond'ring men to see. 

But in our groping we completely miss 
The point of what we'd make our words express. 
There may be words in other worlds than this 
To reach the subtle core of things, and dress 
Our finest feelings in some lingual garb 
Conveyable to other ears than ours — 
Grief of the Christ whose side receives the barb ; 
Or sweet, soul-thrilling fragrance of the flowers. 

When comes the anniversary of him 
Whose name we love, whose mem'ry we revere, 
We still attempt, in language vague and dim. 
To voice a feeling deep, and strong and clear — 
Using the hackneyed phrases o'er and o'er 
As oft as comes our idol's natal day; 
Missing each time, as we have missed before. 
The soul of that we'd give our souls to say. 



92 



THE HARDENING PEOCESS 

HE went without underwear half of his life, 
Just to harden himself. 
He boasted — sometimes came a boast from his 
wife — 
How he hardened himself. 
!N"o overcoat ever was seen on his form, 
And yet he contended he always was warm — 
He feared not the blizzard, he feared not the storm. 
He had hardened himself. 



He slept in a tent, with mosquito bar sheets — 

Just to harden himself; 
Slept out through the snows and slept out through 
the sleets, 

Just to harden himself. 
He wouldn't have slept in a house — mercy, no ! 
Such coddling as that brought humanity woe; 
E'en when it was twenty or thirty below 

He would harden himself. 



One night the thermometer dropped like a shot 
While he hardened himself. 

It broke all the records, so chilly it got, 
While he hardened himself. 

Next morning he didn't come out of his tent 

And when to awake him his gentle wife went, 

93 



She found him — froze stiff ! He just couldn't be 
bent! 
He had hardened himself — 

At last, 
Really hardened himself. 



94 



WHAT OF YOUE FIGHT? 

WAS your weight behind the blow? 
Do you positively know 
'Not another ounce of power could have gone into 

your punch ? 
Left you any stone unturned, 
Any rearward bridge unburned — 
Did you stake your last simoleon to justify your 
hunch ? 

In the effort that you made 

Was your utmost strength displayed ? 

Did you mutter : " If His in me to get by with it, 

here goes ! " 
Did you say, " I'll pay the price 
Now, to save the time of twice " — 
Did you hit out from the shoulder, leaning forward 

from your toes ? 

Did you try, or think you tried ? 

Did you bore in, savage-eyed. 

Till your foeman's solar-plexus or the apex of his 

jaw 
Was unguarded? Did you land 
With a wallop in each hand? 
Should the fight have been a knockout, 'stead of 

stopping with a draw? 

Know, when every fight is done — , 
Be the vict'ry lost or won — , 

95 



There was not a drop of fighting lying idle in your 

breast. 
Even bruises and defeat 
Have their modicum of sweet 
When you know that in the battle you have done 

your level best. 



96 



A FACIAL STUDY 

HE stood on the street — a wretched thing of 
tatters, rags and bloat. 
He had no pockets for his hands, so he wrapped 
them in his coat — 
His threadbare, wind-whipped, faded coat that did 
not keep him warm 
Beside the slender post that stood between him 
and the storm. 
And while dejected thus he loafed and shivered in 
the gale, 
A counterpart of him came by, making a zigzag 
trail. 
As the staggerer passed the sober tramp I caught 
the latter's eye — 
The envious look of a sober bum when a 
drunken bum went by. 

An envious look ? Yes, that was there, but vastly 
more beside. 
I saw a look of shame contort that visage bleary- 
eyed. 
'Twas such a look as plainly said: "A counter- 
part of me I 
My drunken self as I appear, with all the world 
to see ! 
"We're both among the down-and-outs — no use to 
try again 
To take a high or honored place among the 
ranks of men ! " 

97 



All this with envy was combined — I thought I 
heard a sigh 
From the wretched, ragged, sober bum as the 
drunken bum went by. 

And I thought I noticed a strong disgust and 
maybe a gleam of hope 
In the sober one's face as he watched his friend 
in his aimless weave and grope. 
I thought I saw a feeble, faintly flickering flash 
of life 
From the burned-out fires that once had driven 
his souFs ambitious strife. 
But perchance I erred, and perhaps the hope that 
I half believed I saw 
Was a fantasy born of the prayer I made as I 
gazed at the loose-hung jaw. 
The mottled cheek and the stubbly chin, the 
blurred and blearing eye — 
That look on the face of the sober bum when 
the drunken bum went by. 



98 



JUST NOTHIN' 

SITTIIsT' all lopped over with yer eyes half shut, 
Watchin' somethin' movin' in the field out 
there ; 
Somethin' sorto movin' by that old, gray hut — 
Dunno if it's paper or a hen — don't care ! 

Watchin' somethin' movin' — all yer mind asleep 
'Cept enough t' wonder what the deuce that is — 
Wouldn't move a muscle t' find out — just keep 
Wonderin' continyus — it's such easy biz ! 

Sittin' at the depot on a rusty truck, 

Shadder of yer suitcase movin' faster than yer 

mind! 
View so less-than-nothin' you believe you'd be in 

luck 
If, until your train come, you was temporary 

blind. 

Man off in a fodderfield — you see 'is overalls 
Bluer than th' gray-blue sky; his black an' sorrel 

team 
Movin' on from shock to shock — small enough 

fer dolls! 
Afterward you wonder if you seen 'em in a dream. 

Two folks come a-walkin' from th' main street o' 

the town — 
Hear th' bus a-rumblin' like th' distant roll o' 

drums! 

99 



Somethin' creaks ; y' see tli' target-paddle droppin' 

down, 
Bus man hikes 'is pants an' spits an' grunts out, 

" Hyer she comes." 

Waitin' fer a railroad train at little dumps like 

that 
Is just th' nearest zero you can find below th' sky. 
Wish I had a dollar fer each hour I have sat — 
" Killin' time ? " I gosh, it's just a-lettin' of her 

die! 



100 



THE TRIFLINGEST JOB 

I'VE seen men work at everything that's piffling, 
seems to me, 

From pounding sand in ratholes down to playing 
auction bridge; 

I've seen men spend a half a day at lining up a bee 

That flew from clovered valley to the woods be- 
yond the ridge. 

But the job that's always proved to be the trifling- 
est of all; 

That has brought the least returns and made the 
failure most complete, 

Was backing up a gang of ginks against a sunny 
wall 

And telling " funny " stories at the corner of the 
street. 



I've seen folks play at mumbly-peg and horseshoe 

pitching, too. 
I've seen 'em stand for hours watching some one 

climb a pole; 
I've seen 'em lamp safe-movers while they eased 

their burden through 
A window; watched 'em watching down a ragged 

gas ditch hole. 
IsTow as trifling as these capers, they're important 

in compare 
With the other job I mention — sure forenmner 

of defeat: 

101 



Lining up a bunch of loafers in the balmy, springy 

air, 
And telling " funny " stories at the corner of the 

street. 

I'll bet a pewter nickel with a hole in it, that when 

These wasters come to judgment with the others, 
by and by. 

When hotel-rocker-warmers and the other sons of 
men 

"Who killed their time most foolishly, have strag- 
gled to the sky — 

I'll bet a pint of cookies that the one who'll fare 
the worst 

When, standing at the threshold, he is questioned 
by Saint Pete, 

Will be the one referred to as the chief of the 
accurst — 

The one whose " funny " stories smirched the cor- 
ner of the street. 



102 



BECOMING A MAK 

I USED to think, when I was small, that all I 
need to do 
To be a man, was just grow up. That was before 

I knew 
So much of grown-up males who lack as much 

that manhood needs 
As when they were but juveniles and dreamed of 

manly deeds. 
So I have learned this much, at least, since when 

my life began: 
It takes much more than growing up to be a real 

man. 

" When I grow up and be a man," you hear the 

small boys say, 
As if by merely growing large they should be men 

some day. 
But, knowing manhood's requisites in larger sense, 

they'll learn 
There's much besides their body growth for which 

they ought to yearn. 
The stately St. Bernard is more than just a larger 

pup — 
It takes much more to be a man, than just a-grow- 

ing up! 

Eine breadth of vision, self-control, a boundless 

charity, 
A gentler tongue, a stronger faith, more perfect 

clarity ^^3 



In spirit-vision; patience vast — more patience 

still, and more; 
Wisdom to know — and to forget — all that has 

gone before; 
Courage to smile though sorrow fill unto its brim 

your cup — 
More is required, to make a man, than merely 

growing up! 



104 



THE HIDDEN PLAYMATES 

THE old man went where the hoys had been 
That he used to play with, long ago ; 
To the white schoolhouse they had studied in, 
With the church and the graveyard down below. 
As he stood alone with his white head bowed, 
The years slipped off from his mind and soul 
And he lifted his voice to call aloud 
His one-time mates' familiar roll: 

" Tom ! " ITever an answei but echo came. 
" Bill ! " Cows in a nearby field looked up. 
"George," "Philip," "Ben"— it was still the 

same; 
And grief drops welled in the old man's cup. 
" They are hiding from me, those rascals are. 
As they used to hide in the days gone by. 
When * books ' let out, and near and far 
We romped and ran as we played ' I spy.' 

" But there was a rule that it wasn't fair 
To hide in the graveyard, near the church. 
And once — when we told ! — when Ben hid there, 
The teacher taught him the feel of birch. 
* You mustn't play where they've laid their dead,' 
She cautioned him and the other boys. 
' It's wicked to hide 'mid the mounds,' she said, 
'With your clumsy feet and your thoughtless 
noise.' 

105 



" I am sure they have broken that rule today 
As I call and never an answer comes. 
But none will chide them or say them nay — 
Those mischievous lads who were once my chums. 
Sometime, when I've called to the boys again 
And listened in vain for their shrilled reply, 
I'll brave the teacher, like wayward Ben, 
And hide myself 'mid the mounds near by." 



106 



SPORT 

HE drove a motor car that looked just like a 
plumbing-shop. 
It had nine hundred ways to run and nary way 

to stop, 
And when he cut the muffler out and started to 

warm up 
It sounded like a shootf est in the factory of Krupp. 
He had a hairpin turn to make — did he shut off 

the power? 
Not quite ! He took that awful swerve at ninety 

miles an hour. 
A tire came off — they gathered up a full square 

inch of skin 
Beneath the hideous devil-cart where this poor 

chap had been. 

And that is " sport ! " 

He sat within a dirty boat upon a fishless stream ; 
He threw his high-priced bait far out where 

flashed the ripple's gleam. 
The sun came by and cooked his back, the black 

ants chewed his flesh, 
The huge mosquitoes pierced his shirt at every 

blessed mesh. 
He had been told — and truthfully — that not a 

fish existed 
Within a dozen miles of there; but still the chap 

persisted 

107 



Until he ached in every bone and reeked at every 
pore, 

Then wretchedly he plodded back to his camp- 
cabin door. 

And that is " sport ! " 

He took a gun and tramped all day o'er forest 

brake and fen 
(Whatever both those places are) far from the 

haunts of men. 
He didn't have a bite to eat that he'd have touched 

at home. 
At night he lay on bony boughs beneath the star- 
gemmed dome; 
While woodticks bit him to the quick and sleepless 

hoot owls sang 
Till he and his companions were a cross and 

nervous gang. 
]^ext day they faced the constant fear that each 

might shoot the other, 
And henceforth bear the brand of Cain as one 

who'd killed a brother. 

And that is " sport ! " 



108 



THE GENERAL STOEE 

I'D know it by the sight of it, I'd know it by 
the smell ; 
I'd know it by the sound of it, and know it mighty 

well. 
I'd know it if you set me down at midnight, 'mid 

the scent 
Of coffee, " coal oil," sugar bins and country but- 
ter blent. 
With eyes shut, I can smell again the prints upon 

the shelf 
Amid the hickory shirting — you could do the 

same yourself 
If you had lived among them in the days when 

life was bleak 
And all you saw was in the town — say every 

other week. 

On that side is the candy — I can see it now, and, 

oh. 
How good those striped sticks used to look in days 

of long ago! 
On this side is the muslin with blue trade marks 

printed on. 
The bleached and unbleached side by side; and 

here's some slazy lawn 
And dimity that wouldn't sell (they'd bought it 

by mistake) ; 
Some blacking, fans and currycombs, with hoe 

and garden rake. 

109 



We used to carry in the eggs and butter, and we'd 

buy 
Our sugar, tea and bluing and the concentrated 

lye. 

We used to wander back into the small room where 

they kept 
The kerosene and axle grease — 'twas hardly ever 

swept ; 
But there it was we found the scales and weighed 

ourselves and said 
It wasn't like the steelyards out in our old wagon 

shed. 
'Twas there that in the springtime pa would buy 

us all straw hats, 
The ten-cent kind made out of straw they use for 

making mats. 
In fall we got our foot gear that must last the 

winter through, 
For pa said : " Them's yer winter boots — ye've 

got t' make 'em do." 

I've been in houses mercantile that covered blocks 

and blocks; 
I've seen the clerks that swarm around in bevies 

and in flocks; 
I've seen the elevators ; but I cannot make it seem 
Like anything substantial, for 'tis nothing but a 

dream. 

110 



To me the real "store" will be, as long as life 
shall last, 

That smelly country village place I knew there 
in the past. 

With just one clerk to sell you things — some fel- 
low that you knew, 

Though sometimes on a circus day there'd be as 
high as two. 

!N"o fun to " do th' tradin' " like I used to, any 
more — 

How clear is memory's picture of that " gen'ral " 
country store! 



Ill 



THE ETERNAL BEGINNING 

THIS morning is the time when I begin. 
No former life has ever entered in 
To dull me. I have had my nightly rest — 
Sufficient; I will play it was the best. 
I start unhandicapped by old-time fears, 
Unapprehensive of the pregnant years 
Still in the future. But with face serene 
I go my way — night wiped the old slate clean. 

This morning will I love the mate I chose 
Once on a time — the trouble that arose, 
So long ago as yesterday, is dead. 
Nor, martyr-like, upon her patient head 
"Will I heap coals of fire — and renew 
The bickering that the kindly night withdrew. 
It is as though we met and loved afresh. 
As ere God made us one in name and flesh. 

The humbled spirit that was mine last night 
Gave place to one triumphant ere the light. 
The bitter knowledge of my own defects 
Yields to a braver spirit that directs 
Myself and, by and large, my destiny — 
No timorous, fear-born phantom threatens me. 
The past, a signed report, has been turned in : 
This morning is the time when I Begin. 



112 



UNPAKDONABLE 

THERE is pardon for failure to reach just the 
mark 
You'd set for yourself in the struggle of life. 
There's forgiveness for him who, through lacking 
the spark 
Of genius, is " downed " in the thick of the 
strife. 
There is balm for the pride of the fellow who fails 
To attain what he wished when his struggle be- 
gan. 
But the world will be deaf to the babyish wails 
Of the man who does less than the best that he 
can. 

The world's fairly just in accrediting praise 

And fairly judicious in placing the blame. 
Its eye's fairly clear in observing the plays 

In front of the grand stand in life's busy game. 
The runner who's spiked is forgiven his limp. 

And nobody kicks o'er the pace that he ran. 
But the hoot and the jeer for the white-livered imp 

Who does any less than the best that he can. 

When we finish our season and pennants are won. 
We'll be judged not so much by our batting per 
cent. 
As by what, with more effort, we ought to have 
done; 
By the time we have wasted on indolence bent. 
113 



There'U be less of " What did you ? " than " What 
could have been ? " 
In the light of equipment your work they will 
scan. 
They'll forgive you for failing the pennant to win, 
But never for less-than-the-best-that-you-can. 



114 



THE EASIEK TASK 

NO matter what the treatment he accord me, 
I will not let dislike embitter me ; 
Whatever unrest unkindness might afford me, 
I will keep sweet, however hard it be. 
For I have learned — and oh, how slow the learn- 
ing, 
And with what costly grief has it been mated ! — 
Hate in its author's heart has fiercest burning — 
'Tis harder work to hate than to be hated. 

Year after year a man may hate his brother — 
Each waking hour with bitterness be filled. 
This hate may bring discomfort to the other — 
But, in the hater, joy is well-nigh killed. 
And so I will not harbor hate, nor hoard it — 
I've learned my lesson, though perchance belated. 
The honest truth is this : I can't afford it ; 
'Tis costlier to hate than to be hated. 



115 



SONG OF THE FAMILY MAIT 

I'LL stick around. The Good Book says that I 
Must flock with angels in the by and by. 
And if the angels look like what I've seen 
So labeled in each book and magazine 
That spoke of them, I'd rather have my folks 
Than any of those semi-feathered mokes. 

I'U stick around. My people know my faults 

And make allowance. When my spirit vaults 

Into the blue and starts to circulate 

Among the flying brand of vertebrate 

That know me not and can not sin themselves, 

I'll wish me back upon the gray stone shelves 

Inside the mausoleum, or with those 

Who used to know me in my working clothes. 

I'll stick around. That is, if angels seem 

Like those oft pictured from the artist's dream. 

I can not say I gladly look ahead 

To changing company when I am dead. 

God is as good as I could wish Him, when 

He sends me home to wife and kids again. 



116 



THE BOOK FOR ALL TIME 

' 'npHERE never was a trouble yet," I've heard 

-*■ my mother say, 
" That wasn't mentioned in this Book I study 

every day. 
There never was a crisis in a human life, I'm sure. 
But had its prototype in this — the Book that must 
endure." 

She doesn't say things to me now — that mother 

wise of mine — 
At least not with the sort of voice she did. But 

clear and fine 
I hear her admonitions just as plainly now as 

when 
She read to me the same old things, again and yet 

again. 

I didn't know it sank so deep — the wisdom she 

imparted. 
It took the years — relentless years that left me 

heavier-hearted — 
To show me how her words and voice I thought I 

slightly heeded 
Were stored to give my later life the things it 

sorely needed. 

And now when, in a hotel room, I take the little 
Book 

The Gideons — God bless them ! — gave, I rever- 
ently look 

117 



Through page on page and find therein, to my pro- 
found surprise, 

Full proof, through this great wonder Book, that 
God's all-seeing eyes 

Foresaw that day — that very day that was so new 

to me. 
And had discoursed, through minds inspired, on 

all that I should be 
And do, throughout the crisis that had seemed to 

me unique ! 
How marvelously down the years those wondrous 

pages speak! 

And, strangely, things I read in there sound dif- 
ferent, somehow. 

From ordinary printed stuff. And hence my little 
vow 

That I, both for my mother's sake, and for my 
own sake too, 

Will search the Scriptures every day — they tell 
me what to do ! 



118 



THE EXCEPTION 

WHEN the world is bright and sunny and he's 
feeling blithe and gay, 
He's his daddy's constant shadow from the dawn 

till closing day. 
When his face is wreathed with dimples and his 

heart is singing loud 
Why, his father is a monarch with immortal traits 

endowed. 
Not another human creature is essential to his 

joy— 

He will tell you any moment that he's " Fawer's 

only boy." 
But 'tis quite another story when there's sorrow 

with the lad, 
For he always wants his mother when he's sick or 

when he's bad ! 

Father's good enough in sunshine ; but the coming 
of the storm 

Brings a hunger for the hugging that is gentle, 
soft and warm; 

Brings a need for tender croonings and the sooth- 
ing " Never minds " 

That, excepting in a mother's arms, no human 
ever finds. 

So he turns his back on father — can not see him 
for a minute 

When his over-arching baby sky has clouds of 
trouble in it. 

119 



[When the hirds are singing sweetly he's forever 

tagging dad, 
But he always wants his mother when he's sick or 

when he's bad. 



120 



THE NEARER LOVES 

YOU ask me: "Are the journeys hard?" 
And " Does the time seem long ? " 
You marvel that, though travel-worn, I lift my 

voice in song. 
The waits are weary, food ill-cooked, the beds give 

fitful rest. 
Yet do I bear it cheerfully and labor on with zest. 
You wonder why — I'll tell you, friend, how such 

a thing may be: 
I have a love that comes between my selfish self 

and me. 



My own discomfort grieves me not while letters 

from my flock 
Proclaim their vital welfare. I can bear each 

brunt and shock 
With fortitude and laughter if the ones I leave at 

home 
Are well in mind and body while their guardian's 

a-roam. 
Their joy is vastly dearer than my own can ever 

be — 
That love's so close it lies between my inmost self 

and me. 

God pity him who has himself alone to fret about ! 
With nothing sweet between him and the cares that 
flail and flout. 

131 



His room is cold, his food is bad, his train is cruel 
late — 

He stands the gaff unarmored and bewails his bit- 
ter fate. 

But I, if all go well at home, am happy as can be, 

And thank the Lord for love that lies between my- 
self and me. 



122 



"AND SHUT THY DOOR" 

** But thoUj when thou prayest, enter into thy 
closet and shut thy door." — Bible. 

' ' A NT) shut thy door ! " How well He knew 

•^^ This human being He had made! 
When day^s long hours have harried you 
At home or in the marts of trade, 
How exquisite your spirit's thirst 
To be aloof a little while 
From that which frets and vexes worst — 
The constant need to beck and smile. 

You are alone within your room; 
And yet your spirit craves still more 
Assurance that no soul may loom 
O'er your horizon — " shut thy door." 
The sound of turning round the key 
Within the lock — the balm it gives ! 
The current of your thoughts flows free, 
Till soon again your best self lives. 

This person and that other drew 
Some vital part of you away — 
They pulled and hauled and tortured you 
Through all the busy, patient day. 
This shut-in hour with none but God 
(Who ne'er intrudes) will soon restore 
Your feet to paths in calmness trod: 
Enter your room " and shut thy door." 
123 



IS IT LONG? 

' 'TN" two more days I shall be home again," 
■^ I told my wide-eyed baby boy. And then 
Swift, sob-choked came his question : " Is that 

long?" 
I held him in my arms that love made strong 
And soothed : " To you, but not to me, my son — 
It will seem short to you when it is done." 

I beg to know whence comes the rose's flame. 
He whom we worldlings variously name 
Has promised me that, when this life is o'er, 
To me He will reveal all hidden lore — 
The alchemy of blossom, leaf and tree 
And every other baffling mystery. 

My fretting magnifies the long delay 

Before the dawning of my wiser day. 

I voice the burden of that baby song, 

Pleading, impatient, " Father, is it long ? " 

" To you," He smiles, " but not to me, my son — 

'Twill seem full short to you, when life is done." 



124 



A HUMAN^ HUNGEK 

IWANTA dream o' floatin' on a big, pink cloud 
With fiddles singin' sleepy an' a flute a-playin' 
loud, 
An^ a planner played so soft you sometimes think 

she's quit — 
Then you would whisper to yourself, " Why, no ! 
She's playin' yit ! " 

I wanta dream my "body's well, my whole self 

feelin' good — 
Jest everything the good Lord give me, workin' as 

it should; 
An' dream o' floatin' high an' high without no 

skeer at tall, 
A-thinkin' what a joke it was that once I feared 

I'd fall. 



I wanta dream o' lazy shine an' wind caressin' so 
Y' couldn't even wonder if it's warm enough er no. 
An' most I'd dream of some one feelin' just th' 

same as me 
A-holt my hand an' pressin' jest as gentle as can 

be — 

Some one that never has to say a single tender 

word 
But says it always — always, jest as plain as 

singin' bird. 

125 



I'd lose what trouble's in mj heart an' all there 

ever was — 
Lord, how I long for happiness, like everybody 

does! 



126 



"FORGIVE ME" 

WOULDN'T it be good, my brother, 
If the sun could always shine ? 
If we lived for one another, 

Wouldn't every day be fine ? 
Life were sweeter still, believe me, 

Ereer far from wails of woe 
If those simple words " Forgive me " 
Didn't choke a fellow so. 

Were our lips not schooled to smother 

All that's finest in the heart, 
Wouldn't it be easy, brother. 

Aye to choose the better part ? 
Oh, this world were sweet, believe me, 

Eree from bitterness and woe 
If those blessed words " Eorgive me " 

Didn't choke a fellow so. 



127 



THE HUSBA:t^D'S INQUISITION 

WHAT have I borne of her sorrows ? 
What of my pleasures shared ? 
Yesterday, now and tomorrow — 

Long as my life is spared, 
These are the questions I ask me. 

Oft as I think of her; 

Always with this I task me. 

Often with eyes a-blur. 

First in my mind up-springing. 

When in the night I wake. 
Last through my heart-thoughts winging, 

As restward my way I take; 
Always the self-same question. 

Ever the wistful note — 
Aye at its mere suggestion. 

Something obstructs my throat. 

Never a need of saying, 

" What has she done for me ? " 
God — may He heed my praying — 

Knows what a treasure she. 
This — only this I'm asking. 

What have I done for her ? 
Always my soul thus tasking — ^ 

Often with eyes a-blur. 



138 



TO A BABY GIRL 

A LAMB born to a world of wolves that howl 
Upon your trail; that snarl and drool and 
growl 
To capture you and gorge themselves afresh 
Upon your soft, love-consecrated flesh. 
A blossom blown for trampling under feet 
Of vandals who desire your soul's defeat. 
Ours till, by winds of Time and Trouble hurled, 
You are fed, living, to man's ravening world. 

Kneeling or standing, all our parent life 

Is one blood-sweating prayer that in the strife 

Confronting you, the odds for right may win; 

That when the struggle ends you may have been 

Loved always with the tenderness that now 

We give, chaste as a sacerdotal vow. 

But oh, the fires that rage along your path 

Where you must dare your fellow beings' wrath I 

Your beauty that provokes the prideful tear 
In doting parent eyes, will bring the leer 
Of fawning brutes that slaver for your life — 
O knowledge that goes leaping like a knife 
To all our finest feelings! While you may, 
Cling to the ones that love you so that they 
Would gladly die — that you be undefiled — 
God keep you safe, O tender woman-child I 



129 



THOSE NIGHTS OF BROKEN SLEEP 

WE used to worry for our children's sakes — 
Because young Jim would carry garter 
snakes 
In his pants pockets, and hecause Jemima 
Would take the stairway two steps at a time. 

Many a night we've lain awake and fretted 
Because our Angelina, spoiled and petted, 
Threw oft her little milk cup to the floor ; 
We lie awake and fret o'er these no more. 

For Jim is thirty-eight and doesn't lug 
In any pocket snake or worm or bug; 
Jemime was thirty-five last June, and weighs 
Two hundred — does she skip the steps these days ? 

While Angelina, thirty-two or so, 

Ceased, decades since, her little cup to throw 

Upon the floor Wish we had back the sleep 

We missed when o'er their faults we used to weep ! 



130 



THIS DAY 

THIS is bound to be — well, say ! — 
One humdinger of a day! 
It may rain, but what's the diff? 
What would happen to us if 
It should fail to rain and then 
Clear up, cloud and rain again? 
Whatsoe'er the weather be. 
This will prove, for you and me 
(As I started out to say), 
One dicknailer of a day. 

Ere the night comes you will get 
Hungry, and some meals, I'll bet; 
You'll be thirsty, so I think, 
And relieve that thirst with drink ; 
You will have a chance to do 
Favors for some one whom you 
Long have known and owed a kindness ; 
You are free from deafness, blindness, 
Or, if not, you feel I Oh, say I 
This will be a corking day. 

What I mean to say is this: 
Every day has some of bliss. 
Just endure with patient smile 
Things that hurt. Eor after while 
There will come the happiness 
That shall lighten your distress — > 
131 



Lighten it? iN'ay, 'twill destroy it. 
Life will change and you'll enjoy it. 
Every morning, just you say; 
" This will be one bully day ! " 



133 



"AEE YOU THERE?" 

I LIKE to play close by my father's den, 
Where he's at work, and every now and then 
Ask : " Father, are you there ? " He answers 

back: 
" Yes, son." That time I broke my railroad track 
All into bits, he stopped his work and came 
And wiped my tears, and said : " Boy, boy ! Be 

game ! " 
And then he showed me how to fix it right. 
And I took both my arms and hugged him tight. 

Once, when I'd asked him if he still was there. 
He called me in and rumpled up my hair. 
And said : " How much alike are you and I ! 
When I feel just as boys feel when they cry, 
I call to our Big Eather, to make sure 
That He is there, my childish dread to cure. 
And always, just as I to you, ' Yes, son,' 
Our Father calls, and all my fret is done ! " 



133 



A COKTIDENTIAL PRAYER 

MY small deceptions, Lord — you know of 
them; 
My wee prevarications, kindness-born — 
I've often thought You would not quick condemn 
These, in the awfulness of Judgment Mom. 

Where truth can only give a thrust and sting, 
Where cureless, needless hurt it must inflict, 

I can not think You'll cavil till we bring 
A perfect score — You will be just, not strict. 

If love entice us from the beaten trail — 
True love, not passion, as we read of it — 

If put to test 'twixt love and truth, we fail 
The center of truth's target aye to hit — 

I can not think You'll hold us to account 
For sacrificing self to save another 

From fruitless sorrow, e'en in small amount. 
Should we love most our conscience or our 
brother ? 



134 



A GENUINE MAN 

SOME days ago I met a man who'd known 
The very best of life's material things — 
A servant-crowded palace of his own, 
Fine clothing — all that lavish fortune flings 
Before the rich. And he had lost it all, 
Through fault of others. Yet his head was high, 
Within his spirit dwelt no trace of gall, 
A smile was on his lips, his orbs were dry. 

He welcomed me into his home as though 
It were a grander palace — and it was ! 
The spirit of its tenant lent a glow 
To everything, and hid whatever flaws 
There may have been. Scorning apologies 
He welcomed me as but the kingly can. 
That night my soul got down upon its knees 
And thanked its God that we had seen a Man ! 



135 



A CONSOLATION 

SOMETIMES the beads of perspiration stand 
upon my brow 

To think how little I have done from birthtime up 
to now. 

I feel a rimless cipher would be great beside of 
me — 

The depth of my dejection is a painful thing to 
see. 

But I cheer up quite perceptibly and lay my grief 
aside 

When sizing up the pinhead who has grown self- 
satisfied. 

My deep displeasure with myself and all that in 

me is 
Brings pain that's far more poignant than a case 

of rheumatiz. 
I see the thing I'd like to be, which also I am not, 
And on humanity's fair page I rate myself a blot. 
But I am just as proud as if my royal name were 

Guelph 
When I observe the sort of nut that's tickled with 

himself. 



136 



BEWAEE! 

MY frau was good and healthy till the doctor 
saw her tongue 
And placed a rubber speaking tube abaft her lee- 
ward lung. 
Since then she's scarcely able to get up and do 

her work 
At which she once went blithely as the (purely 

fabled) Turk. 
She has a dozen symptoms that she didn't know 

she had — 
Some days she's quite a little worse, and other 

days just bad. 
I wish from out my heart of hearts she hadn't had 

the time 
To see that blooming doctor man who turned her 

bones to lime. 

My little girl was normal till by chance a word was 
dropped 

In question of her eye-sight — then her happiness 
was stopped. 

We took her to a specialist who found her lamps 
were mixed — 

It took a week and twenty-seven bones to get her 
fixed. 

The boy one day had sniffles, bat was happy as a 
king — 

The doctor called it adenoids and, proud as any- 
thing, 

137 



He chopped them out with tailors' shears, and now 

we have to watch 
The little fellow like a hawk, his throat is such a 

botch. 

I'm feeling well, can see a mile to read a fair- 
sized print. 

Mj hearing is as keen as keen — I've never had 
a hint 

Of bother with my senses — all the five are work- 
ing well, 

But would I see a doctor with skilled services to 
sell? 

"Not on your latest tin-type ! For he'd find I had 
the pip, 

Sciatic rheumatism and congenital bum hip. 

And though I clearly see and hear, I bet a horse 
he'd find 

That I'd been deaf for seven years and for a dec- 
ade blind I 



138 



THE YOUNG-OLDS 

WE are the army of yoimg-old men; 
Men who have served the race, 
Graying, with wrinkling face — 
Served for a whole generation, and then 
Started to serve through another again. 
Faithful, else you should have set us adrift 
Long ere this protest we earnestly lift. 

We are the army of young-old men — 

Likely to live a score 

Or better, of good years more. 
Young in our hearts as our heads were when 
Eirst we enlisted, and wiser than then — 

Eitter to serve than we ever have been. 

Graying of hair — is it pardonless sin ? 

We are the army of young-old men — 

Nor pension nor alms we ask, 

Only a whole man's task, 
Paid what we earn — are we asking for more ? 
Shall we, like offal, be thrown to the floor, 

Swept to the rubbish-heap- — carted away 

Long ere the close of our usefulest day ? 



139 



LIFE'S ANESTHETIC 

WHENEVEK I am spirit-worn, and feel 
Double the weight of years that have 
been mine, 
I do not let my heart — the coward ! — steal 

Off to some mountain lake with marge of pine 
And lichened cliffs. I find it sweeter far 

To think of some one burdened worse than I 

And write him things to keep hope's steady star 

Before his care-fagged, trouble- jaundiced eye. 

Ere I have written him a dozen lines 

Of gentle frivol, masking sympathy. 
Songs sweeter than the wind hymn in the pines 

Have sung themselves into the soul of me. 
For never better way has been invented 

To keep lives to love's lambent lodestar true 
Than helping other souls to feel contented 

Till their reflected radiance shine on you. 



140 



WHAT WE PRAY FOR 

WE blather 'round a lot, and ask 
The Lord to tackle many a task 
We don't expect to have Him tackle. 
Much of such " prayer " is mere lip-cackle 
And doesn't even echo, in 
The heart, where all true prayers begin. 

We've formed some habits in the line 
Of praying. Hypocritic whine 
And innocently vain pretense 
We offer up — spoiled frankincense 
And some adulterated myrrh — 
!No miracles thus asked occur. 

But all the while our lips are praying. 
Our far-sincerer minds are staying 
Eight on the job and struggling stoutly 
Producing prayers we mean devoutly 
Although there is no vocal word 
That could by sharpest ears be heard. 

The prayers we offer thus are answered — 
The others never pass the mansard 
On their intended upward flight 
Although we yelp with all our might. 
The things we do just all we may for. 
And scheme and struggle day by day for — 
Those are the things we really pray for. 

141 



A BABY'S SOKROW 

BEFORE the shining grief drop from his eye 
Could course the rosy distance of his cheek, 
A quick smile dug a dimple, deep and dry, 
To which the hot tear turned — a briny creek — 
And formed a lake with velvet shores around, 
In which the baby's sorrow all was drowned. 



143 



THE " SACKEDNESS " OF SOME 
MOTHEKHOOD 

SHE sat behind me in the train 
The while I doped my wearied brain 
With fiction up to date and rank — 
Mouthings of some " eugenics " crank 
Or other gouger after slime 
Such as we find in this our time 
When magazines, in prose or rhyme, 
Kun correspondence schools in crime. 

She was a straight out hoi polloi, 
With three girls and a baby boy, 
All whom she fed on home-fried dope 
Erom that gray canvas telescope — 
Doughnuts (called "fried cakes") petrified, 
With embalmed chicken on the side, 
And when each child had filled his hide 
He, held his outraged turn and cried. 

And then that sainted mother said, 
While whacking Chester on the head: 
" Don't yowl ! 'F you holler when I hit you 
That there conductor man'll git you ! 
Hyer, nigger man, come git this feller — 
He'll cut your ears off if you beller " — 
At which the poor wee, frightened yeller 
Grew dumb as once was Helen Keller. 



143 



Lie after lie she told those brats: 
The colored porter'd get their hats; 
The brakeman'd throw them off the train 
Into Missouri's mud and rain. 
But pretty soon each pain-filled crier 
(Bound for St. Louis and their sire — ) 
Got yelling like a house afire — 
They'd learned that mama was a liar! 



144 



LIFE'S OTHER DIMENSIONS 

T1I7E prate about our "length of days" as 
» V though life had but one dimension; 

We dope and hope and otherwise confront death 
with a fierce contention. 

We seem to think that if we stretch our earth ex- 
istence to its utmost, 

That we have truly lived the most; that of life's 
precious ice we've cut most. 

But this we ought to recollect, when fighting off 
death-threatening sickness : 

Pay less attention to life's length, and more unto 
her breadth and thickness. 

Methuselah lived an awful span, counting by 

month and day and second. 
But I've a hunch that in the end that's not the 

way our lives are reckoned. 
I'm pretty sure that cubics count — that life is 

more than linear measure ; 
That 'tis achievement, not mere time, that will be 

listed as our treasure. 
So it were well to keep in mind, when dodging 

death with wondrous quickness. 
Life holds a lot besides its length — it ought to 

have some breadth and thickness. 



145 



THEIT AND NOW 

THE thing that once disturbed me day by day 
Was having baby leave his little play 
In which I thought him thoroughly absorbed, 
And burst into my workroom, dewy-orbed, 
To sob out all the griefs that might befall 
Him in his sandpile by the garden wall. 

If wealth were mine, what would I not give now, 
Since time has far more deeply graved my brow, 
If still he had no care he might not bring 
Here to my desk, and tell me everything ! 



146 



THE UNIVEESAL LESSOIT 

MY train pours on through the night's black 
sieve — 
I feel her rumble and swerve and give. 
Yet she clings to the rails, by laws divine 
Applied by cannier hands than mine. 
And she lulls me to sleep with her rhythmic flow : 
" Somebody — knows something — that I — don't 
know." 

I raise my gaze to the stars at night, 

Lending through legions of leagues their light. 

Amazed I murmur : " And yet I see 

The meagerest marge of immensity ! " 

And then I whisper, with head bent low: 

" Some One knows something that I don't know ! " 



147 



WHEN" FATHER COOKS 

BETWEEN" new cooks at our house, 
Since mother's foot is hurt, 
Our father says : " We'll have to browse 

Awhile without a ' skirt.' " 
He tells us how he used to cook 

When camping with some guys. 
And says that he could write a book 
On boils and broils and fries. 

Then he starts in to fix the grub, 

Beginning with some bacon, 
Till mother says : " My gracious, hub. 

Why all this smudge you're makin' ? " 
He salts the oatmeal when it's done. 

He burns the eggs he's frying. 
And "uses butter by the ton," 

So mother says, half crying. 

He starts some toast, then calls to mind 

The table isn't set. 
Then, smelling something, runs to find 

The stuff is black as jet ! 
By time a meal is all prepared 

!N"obody's game to eat it. 
Then father says : " I can't be spared 

Downtown — I've got to beat it." 



148 



BEFOEE — AXD THEK 

HE used to prove, beyond the last frail doubt, 
That, when life's feeble candle had burnt 
out — 
Taking with it the spirit we had known — 
That which remained was but a clod, a stone. 
Or any other soulless thing we knew — 
Faultless his logic, so we deemed it true. 

Years came to him, with love and all it brings — 
Wife and some children. One, on angel wings. 
Fled ere a year he'd nestled in the heart 
Of our wise friend. Today I saw him start 
Upon a little, day-long business trip — 
He hid a baby's scuffed shoe in his grip. 



149 



THE VITAL ACCOMPANIMENT 

THE wise admonition goes deeper, they say, 
If you smile when you give it. 
Your righteous life lures other feet to the Way 

If you smile while you live it. 
The word of good cheer finds the heart you had 

meant — 
Sinks into the spirit to which it was sent — 
Lends all of the help it was meant to have lent 
If you smile when you give it. 

The money you handed that brother in need — 

Did you smile when you gave it? 
His pride may have hurt till it made his heart 
bleed — 

Nought but smiling could save it. 
Not an impudent smirk or a meaningless grin, 
Not a smile just as deep as your outermost skin — 
But a love-laden smile, with sweet confidence in — 

That will help him to brave it. 



150 



" NOT WOKTH FOOLING WITH " 

T ^ THAT — " life is not worth fooling with ? " 
^ » You're right, my lad, you're right ! 
Just spread that doctrine far and wide, and spread 

it with your might. 
Life never is worth " fooling with " — this is the 

truth you're giving. 
It isn't worth the " fooling with," but it's wholly 

worth the living ! 

You say it's " not worth fooling with " — the task 

assigned to you. 
You're right again, impatient lad; the thing you 

say is true. 
Perhaps not in the sense you mean — if so, there's 

trouble brewing. 
Your job is not worth "fooling with," but it's 

surely worth the doing! 

No, tasks are not worth " fooling with " — 'tis not 
what tasks were made for. 

You must not fool with them at all^ — that's not 
what you are paid for. 

The best that's in you, body, soul and mind, you 
should be giving 

To what your hands have found to do — not " fool- 
ing " — toiling, living ! 



151 



TO THE LOW-BROW 

THE high-brow puts his pince-nez on 
And looks you over pro and con, 
To make sure whether he approves. 
But never toward his pocket moves 
His stingy hand. He gives to you 
The stern once-over. When he's through 
You're just as rich as when he started — 
Prom nothing worth your while he's parted. 

The low-brow takes a look and grunts: 
" That gink pulls off some clever stunts. 
I'll follow what he does or writes." 
He keeps his promise and invites 
His fellow low-brows to produce 
Such current coin as they have loose, 
Helping the fellow they admire 
To higher levels to aspire. 

I love the high-brow ; his O. K. 
Is worth my struggle, any day. 
But what on earth would we folks do 
Who have to eat a bite or two 
And wear some clothing now and then 
If high-brows formed the world of men ? 
The low-brow's knowledge may be trash, 
But he backs up his smile with cash. 



152 



LENVOI 

Then here's to the high-brow, 
Who bleeds us, 
God-speed us. 
And leads us 

To pity the freak that succeeds us. 

But here's to the low-brow, 
Who needs us. 
And reads us. 
And heeds us. 
And feeds us ! 



153 



A DEFI TO TEOUBLE 

COME, Trouble ! Let me take your hat 
And make you comfy by the fire. 
There, in that chair where oft has sat 

Your grandsire and his grandsire's sire, 
Take ease. You're not the first, you see, 

I've known of your poor-witted clan 
That came to flout and pester me — 
I am a trouble-hardened man. 

You cannot bring a hurt so deep — 

Unless I join my will with yours — 
As to keep off my restful sleep 

Behind kind night's firm-bolted doors. 
You cannot bring a grief 'twill last 

Through many of life's changing years - 
I've known your forbears in the past 

And given them all my surplus fears. 

And thug — O trouble, but I'm glad 

You came to-day ! — always have come 
Some of your tribe, with story sad, 

With countenances dour and glum, 
Upon the eve of blessings rich 

That marked an onward step for me — 
Come, rest within my ingle niche, 

O harbinger of good-to-be! 



164 



A SUMMER OCCUPATION 

LOOKIi^G through the swaying tops of 
maples at the sky, 
Watching while the fleecy clouds in phalanxes go 

by; 

Dreaming wide-eyed visions as I stare into the 

blue — 
Dreaming dreams far sweeter than all earthly 

things but you. 
Resting when my soul had felt it ne'er could rest 

again ; 
Spirit goes a-soaring, myriad million miles from 

men — 
Gazing at the leaf-splotched dome while shining 

clouds drift by — 
Looking through the swaying tops of maples at 

the sky. 

Underneath the maple on a comforter or two, 
Peering, peering tirelessly through emerald at the 

blue, 
Body resting prone upon the earth that bore ua 

all — 
Care and fret and heartache have departed past 

recall. 
Downy pillow 'neath my head with fingers laced 

above. 
Dreaming things tremendously less turbulent than 

love; 

155 



Sweet as love for children when in arms asleep 

they lie — 
Looking through the swaying tops of maples at 

the aky. 

When I get to heaven and my time has come to 

choose 
What through all the endless years my spirit shall 

amuse, 
I shall shun the twanging harp, the viol and the 

lute, 
Shun the lyre and psalter and the sweetly sobbing 

flute. 
'Stead of that I'll pick me out a thick-topped maple 

tree. 
Get a soft old pillow and a comforter and — gee ! 
Won't I simply revel while eternity drifts by — 
Looking through the tracery of maples at the sky ? 



156 



COMKADESHIP 

BKAINS are infectious. When some bright 
soul's by 
To catch your scintillations on the fly, 
How quicker jumps your mind from this to 

that, 
Your thoughts, how accurate, your words, how 

pat! 
You have the blessed consciousness that if 
By chance you should hand out a verbal biff 
That struck the bull's-eye, it should not escape 
And make you feel like donning mental crepe. 

Like some small, timorous child whose father 

stands 
And holds invitingly two love-strong hands 
To catch him when he jumps, your mind fears not 
To leap — it knows full well it will be " got." 
Turn intellectual flip-flaps as you may. 
The other's thought meets your bright thought half 

way; 
Breaks every fall for you, and courage lends 
To higher flights — such folk are God-made 

friends ! 

But oh, to strike a bonehead who requires 
A diagram whene'er your mind aspires 
To use a word from either side the rut 
Our small talk runs in — to unearth a " nut " 
157 



To -whom we must explain ... ye gods, ye gods ! 
When one is thus beset, let's hope Jove nods! 
For in one hour with such a human chasm 
One's gray-stuff retrogrades to protoplasm. 



158 



WHAT VERDICT? 



' ' T LIED to save the one I love." 

■■■ How I should like to hide and hear 

The verdict of the One above 

When this comes to His righteous ear. 

" Ealse witness thou shalt never bear 
Against thy neighbor " — yes, " against." 

Search through the Scriptures everywhere 
Till o'er and o'er you've recommenced 

And recompleted every line 

Within the sacred pages hid, 
And you have better eyes than mine 

If love's deceiving is forbid. 

" I lied to save the one I love." 

I do not say it is not sin. 
I'd like to hear when He above 

Brings His mistakeless verdict in. 



159 



concentkatio:n^ 

rilHIS thing I do was never done before. 
■»• There is no other place in all the earth. 
There is, besides myself, no human more 

That ever thanked his Maker for his birth. 
I and the thing I do are everything 

That is or was or will be 'neath the sun — 
There is no sun across the sky a-swing, 

iNor will be till this task in hand is done. 

Thus, fenced off from the universe, you see 

The stint, clear-eyed, unhampered by tradition ; 
See things as God intended them to be, 

^o other mind dictating your position. 
Through just such means as this comes all the help 

The world receives to lift it from a rut ; 
The State Ship's keel is cleared of clustered kelp 

And doors swing wide that custom had marked 
" Shut." 



160 



HIS DOLLAR 

II\r the pocket of his waist is a dollar, safe and 
sound, 
Wrapped up in an envelope, with his handkerchief 

around. 
When he's gone to bed at night and he's 'most 

asleep, he'll say 
" Where's my dollar — are jou sure it is safely put 

away ? " 
Walking with me down the street, when he stooped 

to tie his shoe 
Out upon the pavement fell his big dollar bright 

and new. 
But we got it back again ere it found the grimy 

ditch 
And once more he wrapped it up and just went on 

feeling rich. 

He has told me what he'll buy with his dollar, 

pretty soon. 
He will buy a motor boat and will take me, some 

forenoon, 
" 'Cross the ocean to the place where the King of 

Europe is." 
There is nothing he can't do with that boundless 

wealth of his. 
He is mine and dear to me, and no joy from him 

I'd keep. 
Yet some night when he's in bed wrapped in sweet 

and dreamless sleep 
161 



I would rob that child of mine of his dollar, if I 

knew 
I could steal, along with it, his belief in what 

'twould do. 



162 



BROTHER'S FAULTS 

BROTHER has a lot of faults that distress me 
so: 
T'other day he purposely whacked me on the toe. 
'iNother time he dumped my things out my dolly's 

trunk, 
Ya-in' at me when I cried, said 'twas " only junk." 
Playin' golden pavement, why he all th' time stays 

"it"— 
Gets right in our way until he simply must get hit. 
Don't know what to do with him — bothers us to 

death. 
Even worser when we scold — just a waste o' 

breath ! 

Brother waits until we start playin' dolls, an' then 
He comes there an' spoils th' game — mercy me, 

these men! 
Mocks us when we play grown-up, strews our 

dresses 'round. 
Scattering our sewing things all about th' ground ! 
Leaves my playthings that he gets, all night in the 

dew — 
Left my picture-puzzle, once — soaked it through 

an' through. 
Traid if he keeps getting worse he will land in 

jail — 
And the very worst of all, he's a tattle-tale ! 



163 



CHILDREN ALL 

THEY are pot-valiant all the garish day 
And treat us parents with mere toleration — 
Wearing the clothes for which we have to pay, 
Eating the food we huy through tribulation. 
But as the night draws on they closer creep, 
And reach out hands to us for reassurance ; 
They snuggle close to us when they're asleep — 
Child-courage in the dark has no endurance. 

ITo need to pen another line to show it — 

The likeness to our attitude to Him 

Who guards us through the dark — all children 
know it ! — 

And when with tears of doubt our eyes grow dim. 

Our troubles gone — we strut and think us fear- 
less. 

Laugh at our night-time qualms, and proudly 
stand. 

But darkness finds us timorous and cheerless 

And groping for a strong, protecting Hand. 



164 



BOY DREAMS 

THE boy is trifling idly with a stick and piece 
of string, 
But you can't tell what he's dreaming all the while. 
His boyish fancy soars upon a strong and fearless 

wing, 
And you can't tell what he's dreaming all the while. 
Some day the world may stand aghast with wonder 

and amaze, 
May rend the very firmament with sycophantic 

praise 
For ill or good that must result from these, his 

dreaming days — 
"No, you can't tell what he's dreaming all the while. 

He whistles tunelessly and shrill and swings upon 

the gate. 
But you can't tell what he's dreaming as he swings. 
His thinking's culmination may decide a nation's 

fate, 
Eor we can't tell what he's dreaming while he 

swings. 
He may lay the dream away until some unborn, 

crucial year ; 
He may hide it till the dawning of another era's 

here; 
But 'tis living, strength'ning, growing, and its 

fruitage must appear — 
JN^o, we know not what he's dreaming as he swings. 
165 



'Tis formless yet and vague past wish or power to 
express ; 

None may fathom where his fateful fancy gropes. 

It lies, mayhap, far, far beneath his boyish con- 
sciousness. 

Yet its spell is strong upon him when he " mopes." 

It may miss its full fruition — bolder dreamers 
may prevail; 

It may end in disappointment — even dearest 
dreams may fail ; 

But forever there in Boyland every dream-craft is 
a-sail ; 

In those dreams live all earth's dangers — and her 
hopes ! 



166 



THE KEENEST PLEASUEE 

WE are so built, we human things, 
That we may touch joy's deepest springs 
Now and again. We should be glad 
That real pleasure may be had 
Erom our accomplishment of what 
Our brains conceived, our two hands wrought. 
But still the finest joy, indeed, 
Is seeing some one else succeed. 

'Tis only now and then that we 

Can bring the longed-for thing to be 

That we ourselves had planned and dreamed, 

That we had plotted for and schemed. 

So if our only triumphs come 

When we have crowned with doing, some 

Of our own plans, we miss a lot 

Of earthly joy we might have got! 

For all the time some one's succeeding 

In some great thing that had been breeding 

In mind and soul of him ; and so 

A sympathetic joy we know 

When he brings triumph out of chaos 

And with his vict'ry song would stay us. 

This makes of earth a Neighborhood 

Our joy when some one else makes good. 



167 



THE NIGHTLY TRANSFEE 

1G0 to sleep in Brother's bed; 
'Cause when his " 'Now I lay me " 's 
said 
(He's two years littler yet than me) 
He's just as bad as he can be 
Unless somebody stays with him. 
So Mother makes the light all dim 
And leaves us there. I always think 
I'll stay awake and never blink. 
And then I shut my eyes a bit — 
They always ache so, and won't quit ! 

But Mother knows, some way or other. 
She tells me : " Lie to right of Brother, 
So when your father comes to do 
The transfer act you're right-end-to. 
And he can lift you as you are 
And lay you down without a jar." 

And, sure enough, next thing I know 
It's morning and the roosters crow. 
And I'm in bed, somehow or other. 
All by myself and not with Brother ! 



168 



ASLEEP AM0:N'G HIS TOYS 

I FOUND my babe asleep among his toys. 
A quarter-hour I'd missed his jocund noise 
And wondered what so quieted the lad, 
Saying : " He's never still unless he's bad." 
But when I tiptoed in — Love's stealthy spy — 
A touching picture met my doting eye : 
One hand lay on the engine of his train, 
The other grasped a tiny aeroplane: 
Upon his face a world-old look of care — 
Mankind in miniature lay dreaming there! 

I lifted him and hugged him to my breast. 
Kissed him, and laid him gently down to rest 
Upon a couch. The weary limbs relaxed ; 
The puckered brow, with wondering overtaxed. 
Released its troubled frown ; and with a sigh 
Of deep relief he slumbered on. While I, 
With murmured words of choking tenderness, 
Smoothed his warm cheek, his hands, his wrinkled 

dress — 
Did all the things we love-mad parents do — 
Old, old caresses that are ever new. 

Sometime the great, kind Father of us all, 
!N"oting we make no answer to His call. 
Tiptoeing in to where we've been at play 
Through all the hours of our allotted day. 
Will find us 'mid our playthings, fast asleep, 
Our toys about us in a tumbled heap, 
169 



Each weary hand upon a trinket laid — 
Some phantom hope born in the marts of trade. 
Then, in His arms, the cares our hearts possessed 
Will yield their place to sweet and dreamless rest. 



170 



TWO WOMEK 

EACH day she spoils her happiness 
By picking out the hardest thing 
For her to get — a snowy dress 

Upon her child who loves to fling 
Dust by the handfuls in the air 

And grime himself; a special shade 
Of goods that she has seen somewhere ; 

A certain outre width of braid — 
Something exceeding hard to get, 
But that she has to have or fret. 

So, though the sun shine warm for her, 
And though the day be bright for her. 

The world holds aye a storm for her, 
And nothing e'er is right for her. 

Ajiother says : " I must decide 

Which are life's big things, which the small. 
If naught of cogent harm betide 

My loved ones, which are best of all 
That I possess ; if I can keep 

My wonted health and know no lack 
Of needful clothing, food and sleep, 

!N"o trifles that bestrew my track 
Can trouble me ; and I shall praise 
The Giver of my glorious days." 



171 



So though the small things oft go wrong, 
The larger joys of life are hers ; 

Her lips are aye attuned to song, 

And she keeps sweet, whate'er occurs. 



173 



PRECEDENT 

T AM the coward's fortress and his friend. 
-^ When his poor courage trickles to an end 
He pleads with me to guide his faltering feet — 
He finds my ready consolation sweet. 
That of ttimes I am wrong is naught to him — 
He clings to me with desperation grim. 

Each herd of elephants selects one wise 
Old pachyderm to go ahead, where lies 
The soft morass. They follow in his spoor. 
The tracks grow deeper. Ere they've crossed the 

moor 
The hindermost bogs down because he feared 
To tread the ground the others' feet had cleared. 

And I am that — the deep spoor in the mire; 
Cold ashes in the place where once was fire 
O'er which the hidebound dotard chafes his palms. 
I am the soother of the weakling's qualms. 
Yet this remember: ISTone has served mankind 
Who did not leave my pleasing self behind. 



173 



WIFEY'S WAY 

OHE has never seen him wildly, uncontrollably 

^ joy-jagged 

When the two of them went calling or to spend 

the evening out. 
She has seldom seen him looking otherwise than 

slightly fagged — 
He's a business man beginning to grow bald and 

rather stout. 
ITot unhappy — just a typical American, you 

know. 
With a solemn look that tells you he has worries 

of his own. 
He's a drudge, and rather likes it, likes to watch 

his business grow. 
But she's sure he's out to frivol when he goes 

somewhere alone! 

She has never seen a symptom indicating giddi- 
ness 

As a quality of hubby's ; he's a glutton for his toil. 

He's as steady as old Dobbin, in his food and in 
his dress, 

And his wildest dissipation is to scheme and plan 
and moil. 

Though she knows it — yes, and trusts him in a 
good and wifely way, 

Though she often faults him grimly for a dull, un- 
social drone, 

174 



Yet she has a sort of feeling that sometimes he's 

madly gay, 
And she's sure he's raising hades when he goes 

away alone. 



175 



LIFE'S SMELTEK 

LO, here are the ricks of red, red dust. 
Lo, there are the cairns of coke. 
The one is as dead as a day long fled, 

One cold as the berg's fog-smoke. 
(For you can't descry with a glance of the eye, 

And you can't discern by the feel, 
The ultimate worth of the things of earth 
When Fate shall have turned her wheel.) 

There's razor-edge steel in the red, red dust. 

There is hell's own heat in the coke — 
Though some be loss and some be dross 

And some go away in smoke. 
(No, you can't descry with the physical eye, 

ISTor guess from the physical feel. 
The potential worth of the things of earth 

When Fate shall have whirled her wheel.) 

l!^ow you — let's say — are the red, red dust; 

And I — let's play — am the coke. 
We may useless seem as we drift and dream, 

With meaningless wail and croak. 
But the wheel of Fate turns soon or late. 

And we meet in the forging fire. 
Which will show, at last, why our lots were cast 

So far from our heart's desire. 



176 



RICE AMONG THE LOWLY 

RICE on the day-coach platform — poor folks 
are wed to-day! 
Taking their trip to somewhere, thirty odd miles 

away! 
She in her dove-tint poplin, he with his neck all 

shaved — 
Wondering, both a-tremble, how such a crowd they 

braved ! 
Many as twenty people, all at the house at once! 
She was a-thrill, bride-fashion, he felt a fearful 

dunce. 
Now they're away — don't watch 'em, drummer- 

inclined-to-tease ! 
Rice on the day-coach platform — God will be 

good to these. 

Rice on the day-coach platform — sleeping car fare 

would take 
All that the happy bridegroom in half of a week 

could make. 
Trip to his aunt's in Hayville, home in a day or 

two — 
Bride with the trip to Europe, she is as glad as 

you! 
Less than she wants ? Who hasn't ! Less than a 

girl deserves? 
Not if the lad be loyal; not if their love ne'er 

swerves. 

177 



Humble her lot since childhood, simple the joys 

she's known — 
Eice on a day-coach platform, queen on a humble 

throne ! 

Rice on a day-coach platform — " couple of rubes," 

you say ? 
Peace! For Somebody's Daughter emptied two 

hearts to-day; 
Somebody's son did likewise. Funny? I cannot 

see 
Just where the jest is, brother — stupid, of course, 

in me. 
Rice on a day-coach platform brings to the waiting 

world 
More than the same white kernels at Pullmans 

palatial hurled. 
"Watch the old grandma smiling — kindly old eyes 

a-blur — 
Rice on a day-coach platform started her Life for 

her I 



178 



THE 'LOWANCE 

PLEASE, missus, if you wouldn't mind, I'd like 
a piece o' cake. 
We're out of it at our house an' dono when we'll 

bake. 
An' if you give me any bread, put plenty butter 

on — 
Mine's been so thin-spread lately that I'm feelin' 

kindo' gone. 
Here comes my brother — would you mind a-givin' 

some t' him? 
For mother's on a 'lowance an' we're livin' sorto' 

slim. 

Some speaker down to mother's club said every 

wife should be 
A independent person, as it were, financialee. 
She " ought to have her 'lowance every week an' 

plan ahead 
What she would spend an' what she'd save," that's 

what that woman said. 
When mother told my pa, he laughed an' said: 

" I gotcha, dear. 
It's takin' all that I can grab — let's see how 

much you'll clear." 

Since then — you see this dress o' mine? I've 

wore it all this week. 
Ma says : " We've got a bad disease — it's name 

is money-leak." 

179 



She drives us from th' telephone we tised to use 

so much, 
An' pa says ma is gettin' " nearly close enough t' 

touch." 
So please, ma'am, if you wouldn't mind, feed me 

an' Brother Jim — 
Ma's workin' on a 'lowance an' we're livin' kindo' 

slim. 



180 



STKAWBERKY MOUNTAINS 

OH! A wonderful range are the Strawberry 
Hills 
With their snow-caps of sugar and cream! 
With the Valley of China where sluggishly spills 

The yellow and succulent stream! 
'Tis a marvelous sight that I mean to take in 

In the earnestest sense of the word. 
In the lives where these Strawberry Hills have not 
been, 
Very little of note has occurred. 

What a pleasure to browse o'er the Strawberry 
Hills 
Ankle-deep in the sugary drift, 
And to wade through the deeps of the broad, 
creamy rills 
Over many a crevasse and rift ! 
And the red and the white and the cream of it all 

Make a sight one can never forget — 
Oh ! The Strawberry cliffs with their summits so 
tall 
Are the finest sierras found yet ! 

'Tis in June that we clamber the Strawberry Hills 
And feed on their snow-crusted slopes; 

'Tis a prospect that makes us forget all our ills 
And live on our dreams and our hopes. 

181 



We can wait all the year with the patience of Job 
For the time of all times to come 'round 

When the Strawberry Hills with their snow-sugar 
robe 
In Chinadish vale shall be found. 



183 



THE STAIR-STEP CHILDREN 

MY sister Annie's five years old, I'm seven, 
Fred is nine. 
I come to Freddie's shoulder, little Annie comes 

to mine. 
We look like human stairsteps when they stand us 

in a row. 
For visitors at our house have always told us so. 
I often wonder how 'twould seem if some one tried 

to walk 
From Annie's head to mine an' his, as all those 
people talk! 

One night along near Christmas time, when 

Annie'd left her bed 
An* come to me where I'd been put along with 

brother Fred, 
Our parents tiptoed up to see if we were safe 

asleep ; 
An' I nudged Fred and Ann to see how still we all 

could keep. 
They stood beside an' whispered, with their arms 

around each other — 
I peeked at them between my lids, an' Annie did, 

an' brother. 

'Twas father murmured : " Little steps, oh, 

whither do you lead ? " 
An' mother softly answered back : " To heaven, 

says my creed." 

183 



" A golden causeway," father said. " They've 

drawn us nigh each other — 
Two lovely girls and one, thank God, a husky elder 

brother." 
An' then we heard our mother say, in laugh-and- 

tear-mixed tone : 
" ' Step children,' yet we'll Christmas them as if 

they were our own." 



184 



THE WISE MAN 

T TE knew — and kept as still with it, 
■■■ -■■ And had his quiet will with it, 
As though it were a secret craved 
By every nation that has braved 
Earth's changing moods — he slyly knew 
Where bloomed the earliest violet blue; 
And where the first spring beauty raised 
Her pink-streaked face to God, and praised 
Him for His goodness; knew as well 
Where first the wind-flower decked the dell. 

He knew, precisely to the day, 

WTien first the raucous-noted jay 

Would flirt his tail and toss his cap 

And dare the squirrel to a scrap. 

And robins — why he was as sure 

When they would make their northward tour 

As anything on earth could be, 

And yet, despite his knowledge, he 

Compiled no books nor wrote long screeds 

About his wilder comrades' deeds. 

I asked him once just why he stayed 
So still about it; and he made 
This answer : " I have no desire 
To prattle of the burgeoning briar 
And of the furred and feathered folk 
Who chirp or chatter, scream or croak. 
185 



They are my friends — their confidence 
I must respect, or give offense. 
Besides," he quaintly smiled, " you see 
They never, never tell on me ! " 



186 



"IT DIDN'T HUKT" 

< 'TT didn't hurt ! " I hear my baby call. 

■■■ By this I know the lad has had a fall. 
Grievous must be the bruise ere he admit 
That he has suffered ache or pain from it. 

" It didn't hurt ! " The cry comes oft before 
His small, o'erbalanced body strikes the floor — 
A prophecy defiant to the fates 
That trip pedestrian novitiates. 

" It didn't hurt ! " If thus he march through life, 

Forswearing all defeat in every strife 

That rises to retard his pilgrim way, 

God bless the lad ! He'll be a Man some day I 



187 



" WORKIIS'^G TOO HARD " 

T KNOW of no task that is softer than this — 
■*• (It's easier, even, than "stealing" a kiss 
From a maid who has left it exposed, in the hope 
Some thief would go by — am I wrong in my 

dope ?) 
Just to hail some poor chap who a task wouldn't 

touch 
And make him believe he is working too much ! 

If half of the people we diagnose thus 
Were to get out and really kick up a fuss 
With half of the work they could do, which is twice 
What most of us do, why the world in a trice 
Would lose half the troubles with which it is 

marred — 
There's nobody living that's working too hard! 



188 



THE ELDER BROTHER 

SOMETIMES at night they leave the lad with 
me, 
When I must " bone " with civics, trig, or Greek. 
Then, though he's safe asleep and I am free, 
There's something yet unnamed that makes me 
sneak 
Into his bedroom and switch on the light 

And turn the pillow's cool side to his face, 

And tuck the covers 'round his neck just right, 

Then sigh and tiptoe gently from the place. 

When they come home, I do not tell them this ; 

But feign a vast and bored indifference. 
For worlds I would not own the poignant bliss 

I find in some new, fine protective sense. 
It is too sweet for me to babble of 

Or to indulge it where it might be seen. 
But something whispers this is parent-love 

In its first stirrings ; and it keeps me clean. 



189 



GOING A PIECE 

ALWAYS, when I went away — 
Were it night or were it day — 
You would " go a piece " with me 
To the corner maple-tree ; 
Or, if I were going far. 
You would see me to the street 
Where I'd catch my depot car. 
You have never known how sweet, 
Till I hurried home again. 
Did this memory remain! 

Through the travel loneliness 

Life was never pure distress ; 

Never did my cup seem all 

Filled with wormwood and with gall. 

No, for everywhere I went — 

Homesick ever, as you know — 

Pining was with loving blent. 

Eor it comforted me so, 

When my heart looked back, to see 

You had " gone a piece " with me ! 

When my last long trip I take — 
Lagging, for my loved-ones' sake — 
Earing forth into the murk. 
All the phantom shapes that lurk 
In the darkness round my way 
^ill be terrorless if I 
190 



(When the others come to say 

Through their transient tears, " Good-by ") 

In that twilight hour, may be 

Sure you'll " go a piece " with me ! 



191 



Bj Strickland Gillilan 
INCLUDING FINNIGIN 

A book containing eighty poems by the 
popular author of this volume. It in- 
cludes *Tinnigin to Flannigan," "The 
Cry of the Alien," "Me an' Pap an' 
Mother," and other famous poems. 

There is something to hold the thought 
or touch the heart on every page while the 
verses swing between laughter and tears. 
In this book the human note rings clear 
and true and readers find something pleas- 
ing for every mood. 

Worth reading over and over. Humanity held up 
to nature. — Boston Olohe, 

A book that will draw a smile from every reader 
and tears from most. — The Christian Advocate. 

It is just as funny as any verses written. — Chicago 
Daily News. 

There is occasion for a smile, a tear or a big laugh 
on every page, according to how you happen to feel. 
— New York Press. 

This book is full of laughter, tears, intense sym- 
pathy, tenderness and commonsense. — Christian En- 
deavor World. 



Attractive cover. Cloth, 12mo. 

Price, $1.00 

Forbes & Company, Publishers, Chicago 



